As the world’s population grays, scientist Prof. Tom Cheung is one of the leading young academic explorers to take up the exacting challenge of providing more knowledge about why we age and how to live a healthier and longer life.

Prof. Cheung and his research team are probing the workings of somatic (adult) muscle stem cells in relation to tissue regeneration and disease. In particular, the Cheung lab focuses on age-related diseases such as sarcopenia, a degenerative loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength during aging. The aim is to understand the molecular mechanisms that lead to cellular aging and decline in function to enable new therapeutics for muscle tissue repair and stave off age-associated muscular diseases.

“Aging is a problem that every person faces. It is something we don’t have a good understanding of, at present, which makes it a very interesting question,” he said.

The Cheung lab is at the forefront of such studies globally. Using a technique called flow cytometry, the group has pioneered muscle stem cell isolation and provided a muscle stem cell gene signature and epigenetic landscape for the field. They are also using this technique to understand how these stem cells age.

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Prof. Cheung received his BA and PhD in biochemistry, from the University of Colorado at Boulder in the US in 2001 and 2006 respectively. He went on to postdoctoral work at Stanford University School of Medicine before arriving at HKUST in 2013.

As a member of HKUST’s Center for Stem Cell Research, Center for Systems Biology and Human Health, and State Key Laboratory of Molecular Neuroscience, he has been making full use of the University’s substantial interdisciplinary expertise in life science, engineering and computer science to pursue his innovative research. Among the tools that Prof Cheung employs to map the way and reach his findings are advanced next-generation sequencing, multimodality imaging, and fluorescent activated cell sorting techniques.

While still in the early stages of his faculty career, Prof. Cheung has already had a host of articles published in many top-tier journals, including Cell, Nature, Cell Stem Cell, Developmental Cell and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, among others. In addition, he received a prestigious fiveyear Croucher Innovation Award in 2015 to help support his studies into molecular regulation of stem cell aging.

“What drives me is the hope that my science will contribute to society by positively impacting people’s lives and finding a way to extend the human healthspan,” he said.