Professor Koh Woon Puay appointed Assistant Dean (Faculty Development)
Published: 01 Feb 2021
Professor Koh Woon Puay has been appointed as Assistant Dean for Faculty Development at the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, with effect from 1 February 2021.
Prof Koh is a Principal Investigator in the Healthy Longevity Translational Research Programme at NUS Medicine. She received her Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS (Honours)) from NUS (1992), PhD in Immunology from the University of Sydney, Australia (2001), and postdoctoral training in epidemiology from the University of Southern California in U.S.A. (2003).
She is also the Principal Investigator of the Singapore Chinese Health Study, a 63,257-strong cohort of middle-aged and elderly Chinese Singaporeans established for the long-term study of dietary and environmental determinants of chronic diseases common among Singaporeans. She has co-authored over 365 scientific papers on diet, lifestyle and genes in relation to risk of diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, gout, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis and tuberculosis disease. She has received over $24 million in research funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), USA and National Medical Research Council (NMRC), Singapore. She is also a recipient of the Ministry of Health NMRC Clinician Scientist Award (Senior Investigator, 2014 to 2019; and 2020 to 2025), the Duke-NUS Dean’s Excellence Awards in Research (2016) and Leadership (2018), and the National Day Public Administration Medal (Bronze) (2019).
Being a population health scientist, Prof Koh’s research interest and expertise lie in unravelling the epidemiology of chronic diseases that are of importance to Singapore, such as cancer, cardio-metabolic, musculoskeletal and neurodegenerative diseases. Being medically qualified in Singapore, and having had PhD training in experimental research and postdoctoral training in epidemiology, Prof Koh incorporates her knowledge of clinical medicine and training in laboratory science with epidemiologic methods to unravel putative mechanistic pathways in disease etiology.
Prof Koh Woon Puay’s new research in the School focuses on building a cohort for an integrated and holistic approach to examining the effects of biological, lifestyle and socioeconomic factors that affect multi-dimensional outcomes as Singaporeans transit from health to morbidity around the age of 75 years. Beyond establishing associations, this cohort, known as SG70, seeks to elucidate the etiologic roles of biological factors in the pathogenesis of health-related ageing outcomes, identify modifiable factors to promote healthy longevity, and discover risk biomarkers that could be developed for early detection or screening of adverse outcomes in ageing.
Besides research, Prof Koh has cultivated her other passion in mentoring. In the last decade, she has acquired unique qualities and skill-sets, along with insights and experience in nurturing clinician-scientists. This comes from her role as a mentor to many budding clinician-scientists, and her former leadership roles as Programme Director of the Master of Clinical Investigator (MCI) in NUS (2008 to 2012), the Lead for the Talent Development Core (2013 to 2016), and also as the founding director for the Centre of Clinician-Scientist Development in Duke-NUS (2017 to 2020).
In her new role as Assistant Dean (Faculty Development), Prof Koh will be involved in the development of the School’s junior faculty members, particularly young clinicians who are keen to pursue research as part of their career.
Congratulations to Prof Koh on her new appointment!
