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Doctor Chan Wan Yi Renee

  • Associate Professor, Department of Paediatrics, CUHK
  • Investigator – SH Ho Research Centre for Infectious Disease, CUHK
  • Investigator – Li Ka Shing Institute of Health Sciences, CUHK
  • Investigator – CUHK-HK Hub of Paediatric Excellence, CUHK
  • Associate Researcher (by courtesy) – CUHK Shenzhen Research Institute 
  • Associate Dean of Students, Shaw College, CUHK

Research Theme

Respiratory Infection

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Biography

Dr. Renee WY Chan obtained her PhD degree in the Department of Microbiology and Department of Pathology, The University of Hong Kong and had her post-doctoral fellow training in the Department of Pathology and Centre of Influenza Research, School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong.

Since she has started her career in Virology, she has more than 100 publications in international peer-review journals. She has developed and validated a non-invasive tool for the SARS-CoV-2 in the paediatric population (Journal of Infection, 2020).

She has been involved in the discovery of an alternative influenza receptor of avian influenza virus in the human upper respiratory tract (Nature Medicine, 2007) and thereby written a review article on influenza virus receptors (Trends in Microbiology, 2008). With her contribution to the better understanding of influenza virus tropism in human, the Hong Kong Institution of Science awarded her with the Young Scientist Award 2011. Her leading publications were on risk assessing the emerging viruses, including influenza virus and coronavirus by studying their tissue tropism and pathogenesis in human and swine respiratory organ ex vivo culture models and well-differentiated primary respiratory cell culture models.

In the capacity of a Principal Investigator, Dr Chan has received 13 competitive grants (HK$ 13M+) and more than 14 full-grants as Co-I (HK$ 20M+).

  • Diploma(Epidemiology)
  • PhD
  • MPhil
  • BSc (Hons)
 

Her research interest is on the host and respiratory virus interactions, including the epidemiology of viruses in hospitalized children; viral interference at population levels and biological models; and viral tropism and risk assessment study for emerging respiratory viruses. A brand new non-invasive nasal epithelial lining fluid collection study has started this year. This initiative aims to collect longitudinal samples to study the microbiome, mucosal proteome, and metabolome of diseased children.

On-going research projects include:

(i) The investigation of rhinovirus diversity in non-asthmatic and asthmatic children and the associated outcomes;

(ii) Tissue tropism and the pathogenesis of human rhinovirus C in the human respiratory tract (an in vitro, ex vivo, and in vivo studies);

(iii) The role of rhinovirus in remodelling human airway epithelia in children and adult; and

(iv) The mucosal immunity upon virus infections.

Her team has a long history in deriving primary human respiratory organ and cell culture models, and recently the organoid model in collaboration with teams in the University Medical Center Utrecht. The integration of clinical and basic research here makes translational application realizable.

  • Frontiers in Medicine
  • Frontiers in Public Health
  • Journal of Virological Methods
  • PLoS ONE

Ad-hoc reviewer of ERJ Open Respiratory Research, BMC Paediatrics, BMC Microbiology, Antiviral Research, Respiratory Research, Scientific Reports, Journal of Clinical Virology, Journal of General Virology, Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses.

  • Teaching programme: Perspectives in Clinical Sciences” (UGEB2791); MEDU3330 Viral Morphology and Replication
  • Summer Undergraduate Research Programme supervisor in 2015-2020, Office of Academic Link, CUHK
  • US Provisional Application No. 62/865,347. Invention Title: N-Substituted Oseltamivir Derivatives with Antimicrobial Activity

For full list of publications, please visit here.

  • Tao KP, Tsun GJG, Lau RWH, Ng CSH, Ko FWS, Chan RWY: Nasal airway organoid model: recapitulating chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and representing disease severity gradient (abstract). American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine 2024;209:A4281. Corresponding author
  • Liu S, Tsun JGS, Fung GPG, Lui GCY, Chan KYY, Chan PKS, Chan RWY: Comparison of the mucosal and systemic antibody responses in Covid-19 recovered patients with one dose of mRNA vaccine and unexposed subjects with three doses of mRNA vaccines. Frontiers in Immunology 2023 Jan 30;14:1127401. Corresponding author
  • Scheeff S, Wang Y, Lyu MY, Ahmadabadi BN, Hau CK, Hui KC, Zhang YF, Zuo Z, Chan RW*, Ng BWL*. Design and Synthesis of Bicyclo[4.3.0]nonene Nucleoside Analogues. Organic Letters. 2023 Dec 22: 25(50):8959-9082. Co-corresponding author
  • Tao KP, Chong M, Chan KYY, Pun JC, Tsun JG, Chow SM, Ng CS, Wang MH, Chan Z, Chan PK, Li AM, Chan RWY: Suppression of influenza virus infection by rhinovirus interference at the population, individual and cellular levels. Current Research in Microbial Sciences 2022 Jun 18,3:100147 Corresponding author
  • Bui CHT*, Chan RWY*, Ng MMT, Cheung MC, Ng KC, Chan MPK, Chan LLY, Fong JHM, Nicholls JM, Peiris JSM, Chan MCW: Tropism of influenza B viruses in human respiratory tract explants and airway organoids. European Respiratory Journal 2019 Aug 54(2):1900008 Co-first author