Biology and Medicine Panel (General Research Fund and Other Funding Schemes for Individual Research)
( as at 13 November 2023 )
Member Sphere of Interest
Chairman
Professor Hongtao Yu* Interests in combining cell biological, biochemical, and biophysical methods; to understand cellular mechanisms governing genomic stability at the molecular and atomic levels
Deputy Panel Chairman
Professor Xiao-fan Wang* Interests in surgery, elucidation of molecular nature and signaling mechanisms associated with the initiation of cellular senescence and development of novel therapeutics for the treatment of various types of human cancer
Members
Professor Seth Blackshaw* Interests in neuronal development and regeneration, hypothalamic regulation of behavior
Professor Daniel Bressington* Interests in multimorbidity in people with severe mental illness, developing/testing psychosocial interventions to improve mental health and mental health literacy/stigma
Professor Marc Cadotte* Interests in ecological and evolutionary mechanisms generating patterns of species diversity and applying the understanding to conservation issues, community ecology, biology invasions, evolution, biodiversity, plant ecology, experiments and ecosystem function
Professor Patrick Yizhi Cai* Interests in Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology, Immunology and Microbiology
Professor Paul Kay-sheung Chan Interests in tumour virology, human respiratory viruses and microbiome
Professor Stephen Lam Chan Interests in hepatobiliary cancers, pancreatic cancer and neuroendocrine tumor
Professor Meng Chen* Interests in phytochrome signaling, nuclear organization, spatial genome reorganization, nucleus-to-plastid signaling and especially the signaling mechanisms by the photoreceptor and thermosensor phytochrome B
Professor Wei Chen* Interests in Systems biology, Functional and medical genomics, Bioinformatics, Precision medicine and individualized therapy
Professor Zhengming Chen* Interests in the environmental and genetic causes of chronic disease, evidence-based medicine and evaluation of widely practicable treatments for chronic diseases (such as IHD, stroke and cancer) as well as efficient strategies for chronic disease control in developing countries
Professor Ying Cheong* Interests in reproductive medicine & surgery, biology of endometrium and endometrial associated pathology
Professor Hongbo Chi* Interests in Immunometabolism, T cell biology and systems immunology
Professor Zheng Dong* Interests in molecular mechanism of cell injury/death, its protection and subsequent regeneration, response of kidney and cancer cells/tissues to pathological conditions of hypoxia/ischemia, metabolic stress, and DNA damage, cell death, cell cycle, autophagy, mitochondria, and epigenetic regulation
Professor Sam El-Osta* Interests in understanding the roles of specific transcriptional components in the regulation of metabolic memory and cardiac disease and further extend our understanding of gene silencing events associated with genomic methylation in pre-clinical models and human populations
Professor Ian Everall* Interests in psychiatry, psychology and neuroscience
Professor James Fawcett* Interests in repairing the damaged nervous system
Professor Dean W. Felsher* Interests in investigating oncogenes initiate and sustain tumorigenesis
Professor Sandy Feng* Interests in solid organ transplantation, transplant immunology/tolerance, cirrhosis and associated complications including hepatocellular carcinoma, and clinical trials related to organ transplantation and including cellular therapie
Professor Jennifer Grandis* Interests in head and neck cancer, signal transduction, precision medicine
Professor Tilmann Harder* Interests in Chemical Ecology of planktonic microorganisms
Professor John Cijiang He* Interests in diabetes, HIB/AIDS, kidney, signal transduction and systems biology
Professor Jufang He Interests in nervous system, sensory systems, hearing, hippocampus, thalamus, entorhinal cortex, auditory system, neuroplasticity, memory encoding, thalamocortical pathway, auditory learning, tinnitus, technolohies for neuzoscience, ultrasound, brain- machine interface, learning and memory, dementia, depressine
Professor Ladd Johnson* Interests in marine ecology and invasion biology
Professor Yibin Kang* Interests in cancer metastasis, cancer stem cell, tumor-stromal interactions
Professor Arthur Yu-Shin Kim* Interests in AIDS and HIV infection, Hepatitis B virus (HBV), Hepatitis C virus (HCV), HIV / HCV coinfection, Immunocompromised patient, Immunology, Substance abuse and Travel medicine
Professor Timothy Kwok Interests in Prevention strategies and psycho-social interventions for dementia
Doctor Jessica CF Kwok* Interests in perineuronal nets; plasticity; glycosaminoglycans; extracellular matrix; spinal cord injury; memory and ageing
Professor Andrew Lever* Interests in retroviruses and rotaviruses, pathogen biology and evolution, gene transfer and gene therapy
Professor Anthony Ho-Ling Liu* Interests in develop and optimize advanced MR neuroimaging methods for improving diagnosis, treatment planning and evaluation of early treatment response of tumors
Professor Rui Hai Liu* Interests in diet and cancer, the effects of functional foods and bioactive compounds on chronic disease risks; specifically including health benefits of antioxidants/phytochemicals in fruits, vegetables and whole grains; food genomics and functional foods for disease prevention and health promotion targeted at cancers, aging, and inflammatory diseases; and natural products and herbal formulations for antiviral activity
Professor William Weijia Lu Interests in the bioengineering, design, development and evaluation of surgical and medical implant and devices, clinical trials of medical device and biomaterials, mechanisms and treatment of bone and joint degeneration diseases
Professor Nancy Kwan Man Interests in liver transplation of graft injury and cancer recuurence, inflammation, immunology and cancer, molecular imaging in cancer research and liver graft injury, development of pharmaceutical treatments for liver cancer metastasis and recurrence, development of small animal models for liver transplantation and liver cancer, Application of robotic surgery and new biometerials in cancer research and Prospective clinical studies of liver surgery and hepatocellular carcinoma
Professor Ronald Ching-wan Ma Interests in diabetes, metabolism, endocrinology, genomic medicine, translational research
Professor Sandie McCarthy* Interests in Prevention, assessment and management of the short and long-term toxicities of cancer therapy
Doctor Kevin O'Shaughnessy* Interests in molecular genetics of essential hypertension, pre-eclampsia, physiology and pharmacology of Aldosterone
Professor Alexander Ploss* Interests in immune responses and pathogenesis to human infectious diseases, including hepatitis viruses, related flaviviruses, and malaria, Hepatocellular carcinoma, Viral hepatitis, Liver inflammation, Humanized mice, In vivo imaging and Genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics
Professor Peter Polverini* Interests in angiogenesis, tumor angiogenesis, endothelial cells, healthcare quality, tumors, apoptosis, cardiovascular system, vascular biology and macrophage
Professor Lit Man Poon Interests in SARS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2, MERS-CoV and human/animal influenza viruses.
Professor Dr. med. Jonas Rosendahl* Interests in genetic studies in gastroenterology, functional studies of genetic variants (in vitro/in vivo), clinical research in gastroenterology
Professor Feng Shao* Interests in bacteria-host interaction, innate immunity, inflammation
Professor Jiangang Shen Interests in oxidative stress in aging-related diseases including cerebrovascular and cardiovascular diseases and cancer and Herbal medicine for cerebral and cardiac vascular diseases and cancer, focusing on antioxidant therapies
Professor Jie Song* Interests in biomaterials and regenerative medicine; design and evaluation of smart synthetic bone / cartilage tissue grafts, metallic implant surface modifications for reducing periprosthetic infections, new therapeutic targets for the development of disease modifying drugs of osteoarthritis
Professor Christopher Tredwin* Interests in Endodontics, Periodontics, Prosthodontics and Restorative Dentistry
Professor Yi Wang* Interests in biomedical imaging and instrumentation, bioengineering, biomedical engineering, image analysis, signal and image processing, scientific computing, biomolecular engineering, algorithms, artificial intelligence, biophysics, biotechnology, computational fluid dynamics, complex systems, network science and computation, computational science and engineering, computer aided diagnosis, neuroscience, statistics and machine learning
Professor Zilong Wen* Interests in the development and function of hematopoietic stem cells, microglia and Langerhans cells and how their dysregulations incur diseases
Professor Kenneth Kak-Yuen Wong Interests in molecular biology of childhood tumors, immuno-modulation in transplantation tolerance and nanomedicine for wound regeneration and tumor therapy, including novel drug therapies
Professor Yang K Xiang* Interests in Pharmacology
Professor Jiake Xu* Interests in osteoimmunology, osteolysis, and mechanisms of bone resorption, bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells and pericytes, screening of natural compounds for the treatment of osteoporosis, deciphering the molecular basis of musculoskeletal diseases using ENU-induced mutant mice and cc mice and intercellular communication and angiogenic potential of endothelial progenitor cells in bone microenvironment
Professor Nieng Yan* Interests in structural biology of membrane transport proteins, with a focus on glucose transporters and voltage-gated sodium and calcium channels
Professor Xian-jie Yang* Interests in ophthalmology, development and diseases of the vertebrate retina
Professor Ella Yeung Interests in muscle physiology, cellular regulation of skeletal muscle adaptation to mechanical stimuli, mechanism underlying muscle damage in muscular dystrophy, sports injury and rehabilitation medicine, exercise and health
Professor Jun Yu Interests in molecular pathogenesis and biomarkers of gastrointestinal (GI) cancers, gut microbiota in GI cancers, non-alcohol steatohepatitis (NASH) and its associated liver cancer
Professor Tao Zhang* Interests in the neuronal processes that mediate visual perception, visually guided behavior and multi-sensory integration/interaction
Professor Xin Zhang* Interests in glial development and pathology, mechanism of FGF signaling in eye development, molecular regulation of cell shape, adhesion and migration and neural degeneration and repair
Secretary
Ms Milly Ng Assistant Secretary General (Research) 1, UGC.

* Non-local Members