July 10, 2023
“Science is endless, it is an eternal mystery. And, I am really fascinated by the charm of biological science.”
Experience：
Dr Weiwei Dai received his B.S. in Biotechnology from Northwest University, Xi’an (2008), M.Sc. in Fish Nutrition from Ocean University of China, Qingdao (2011), and Ph.D. in Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), France (2016). During 2016 and 2023, Dr Dai continued his academic career in United States as a postdoctoral fellow at The Pennsylvania State University (2016-2018) and a Post-Doctoral Associate at Rutgers University (2018-2023). His research has been mainly focused on studying nutrition and metabolism in liver and metabolic diseases including obesity and liver cancer.
Currently, he is focusing on studying cancer metabolism, especially amino acid/nitrogen metabolism in liver cancer, as well as epigenetic regulation on metabolic enzymes in tumor microenvironments. Dr Dai has published 17 peer-reviewed papers, including 8 first-author SCI research articles, such as J Clin Invest, The FASEB Journal, JMCB, BBA Mol Basis Dis., and 2 second-author articles; as well as 2 first-author patents for invention. He also actively serves in the academic community as a member of Chinese Society for Cell Biology and The Chinese Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, as well as journal reviewers for Clinical Science and Bioscience Reports.
Teaching and Research：
Dr Dai will teach courses BIO006 (Key Skills for Life Scientists) and BIO106 (The Biology of Microbes) for undergraduate students, and BIO401(Research Methods in Biotechnology) for master students.
His long-term research interest is to understand the mechanisms how ingested nutrients especially dietary protein/non-essential amino acids regulate intermediary metabolism in physiology and metabolic diseases, including diabetes and liver cancer. Currently, Dr Dai is interested in exploring the novel roles of ammonia in promoting liver tumor growth.
He expects to demonstrate that ammonia serves as a signaling molecular to stimulate mTORC2 and liver tumor growth via calcium channel-dependent manners, and provide a rationale for targeting ammonia accumulation as a new therapy for liver cancer treatment in the following future.
Wishes：
“XJTLU is an international university where everyone can communicate freely and equally with colleagues of different ages, races, academic backgrounds and cultural backgrounds to enjoy a multicultural working environment. I am enjoying the friendly and free atmosphere, and I fully appreciate the opportunity for living in Suzhou and working in XJTLU. Now, I think it is my turn to give my significant and valuable contributions to the Department of Biological Science and School of Science for both teaching and research. ”
July 10, 2023