Associate Professor Kevin Tan Shyong-Wei appointed Head, Department of Microbiology and Immunology
Published: 11 Jun 2020
Associate Professor Kevin Tan Shyong-Wei has been appointed as Head, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, at the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine with effect from 1 August 2020.
Assoc Prof Tan is currently the Vice-Dean (Graduate Studies) at NUS Medicine since 2019. He is also the Head of Innovation in Graduate Studies, National University Health System since 2015.
A molecular parasitologist by training, Assoc Prof Tan obtained his PhD in microbiology from NUS in 1999 and honed his molecular biology skills from 2000-2003 as a postdoctoral fellow at The Rockefeller University, New York City. His research focuses on understanding how gut and malaria parasites commit cellular suicide and exploiting such knowledge to trigger death mechanisms as an anti-parasite strategy. More recently, his team has made new discoveries in the gut microbiome field showing that gut parasites can play unexpected roles in influencing microbiota composition. He is also interested in the problem of malaria drug resistance and his team has developed innovative ways to identify drugs that overcome resistance. Assoc Prof Tan has authored over 100 peer-reviewed articles in international journals and sits on the editorial boards of Microbial Cell, Parasitology Research and PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases.
The School expresses its deepest appreciation to Professor Nicholas Gascoigne for his dedicated leadership of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology since 2013. Prof Gascoigne is highly committed to medical undergraduate and life sciences education and had championed educational excellence by enhancing the microbiology and immunology curriculum.
Once again, congratulations to Assoc Prof Tan on his new appointment, and our deepest appreciation to Prof Gascoigne for his leadership as Head, Department of Microbiology and Immunology since 2013.
