Current position: Post-doctoral Fellow

 

Born and raised in sunny Singapore, Liang Wei won an Agency for Science and Technology (A*STAR) National Science Scholarship to study at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, and obtained his bachelors degree in Natural Sciences (Biological) with concentrations in Immunology and Virology. He performed honours-level research on the role of human cytomegalovirus (HCMV)-encoded micro-RNAs in modulating T cell function with Drs Mark Wills and Inmaculada Montanuy Sellart (Addenbrookes Hospital) After graduating from Cambridge, he performed a year of postgraduate research on hepatitis B virus (HBV) core promoter regulation with Assoc Prof Ren Ee Chee and Dr Ko Huiling (Singapore Immunology Network). He then moved to Boston in 2014 to start his PhD in Virology at Harvard Medical School. Despite never having had much interest in tumour biology (and expressly saying that to a professor working on polyomavirus oncogenesis), several twists of fate have brought him to work on B cell transformation by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) with Asst Prof Benjamin Gewurz (Brigham and Women’s Hospital). Apart from spending hours trying to understand how EBV manipulates B cell metabolism and G protein signaling to grow and survive indefinitely, Liang Wei also finds time to play squash, savour seafood and take in the sights around New England.