• Cancer genomics
• Mutational processes
• Gene regulation
• Bioinformatics and computational biology
• Mass spectrometry

Dr Wong is an Associate Professor in the School of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Hong Kong. He was formerly an Australian Research Council Future Fellow and an Associate Professor at the Prince of Wales Clinical School at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. He received his B.Sc (Hons I), specialising in Bioinformatics from the University of Sydney. As an Oxford-Australia scholar, he went on to complete a D.Phil in Bioanalytical Chemistry at the University of Oxford, UK. This was followed by an Irish Government post-doctoral fellowship at the Conway Institute of Biomolecular & Biomedical Research, University College Dublin, before he returned to Sydney to establish his research group in Cancer Genomics. He has published over 100 original peer-reviewed journal articles with senior authorship in journals including Nature, Science, Science Advances, Cell Reports, Genome Biology, Blood, Molecular Biology & Evolution and Nucleic Acids Research. His current research is focused on the study of mutational processes in cancer and their ultimate effect on gene regulation and function.

Our laboratory is interested in understanding how mutations occur in cancer and what effect this has on the way genes are used. Understanding the mechanism by which these mutations form in the genome is important because it can provide insights into why cancers develop and how they may be prevented. We are also interested in studying how mutations can alter the regulation of gene expression, particularly its effect on transcription factor binding at cis-regulatory elements. We work on all cancer types with cancer genomics data, but have a strong focus on skin cancers, blood cancers and gastrointestinal cancers. Our research makes use of cutting edge genomics technologies along with bioinformatics and computational techniques. We also analyse existing large genomics datasets such as those from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) with a focus on the integrative analysis of different types of omics data.

We are always looking for outstanding individuals with a keen interest in cancer research to join our lab. Some potential projects include:

• Direct detection of DNA lesions and non-canonical nucleotides using nanopore sequencing.
• Profiling the role of modified nucleotides in DNA mutagenesis.
• Exploring the origins of cancer through single cell RNA-seq.

• Long read sequencing of transposable elements in cancer.

Total: > 100 (Google Scholar)

1. Lin J, Wu Y, Tian G, Yu D, Yang E, Lam WH, Liu Z, Jing Y, Dang S, Bao X*, Wong JWH*, Zhai Y*, Li XD* (2023) Menin 'reads' H3K79me2 mark in a nucleosomal context. Science 379(6633): 717-723 *(co-corresponding)
2. Fang H, Yan HHN, Bilardi RA, Flensburg C, Yang H, Barbour JA, Siu HC, Turski M, Chew E, Xu Z, Lam ST, Sharma R, Xu M, Li J, Ip HW, Cheung CYM, Huen MSY, Sweet-Cordero EA, Majewski IJ*, Leung SY*, Wong JWH*, Ganciclovir-induced mutations are present in a diverse spectrum of post-transplant malignancies. Genome Medicine, 2022. 14(1):124. *(co-corresponding)
3. Fang H, Zhu X, Oh J, Yang M, Barbour JA, Wong JWH (2021) Deficiency of replication-independent DNA mismatch repair drives a 5-methylcytosine deamination mutational signature in cancer. Science Adv  7(45) eabg4398.
4. Zhu X, Fang H, Gladysz K, Barbour JA, Wong JWH (2021) Overexpression of transposable elements is associated with immune evasion and poor outcome in colorectal cancer. Eur J Cancer 157:94-107
5. Fang H, Barbour JA, Poulos RC, Katainen R, Aaltonen LA, Wong JWH (2020) Mutational processes of distinct POLE exonuclease domain mutants drive an enrichment of a specific TP53 mutation in colorectal cancer. PLoS Genetics 16(2): e1008572
6. Poulos RC, Wong Y, Ryan R, Pang H, Wong JWH (2018) Analysis of 7,815 cancer exomes reveals novel associations between mutational processes and somatic driver mutations. PLoS Genetics 14(11):e1007779
7. Poulos RC, Olivier J, Wong JWH (2017) The interaction between cytosine methylation and processes of DNA replication and repair shape the mutational landscape of cancer genomes. Nuc Acids Res 45(13):7786-7795
8. Perera D, Poulos RC, Shah A, Beck D, Pimanda JE, Wong JWH (2016) Differential DNA repair underlies mutation hotspots at active promoters in cancer genomes. Nature 532:259-263
9. Poulos RC, Thoms JAI, Guan YF, Unnikrishnan A, Pimanda JE & Wong JWH (2016) Functional mutations form at CTCF/cohesin binding sites in melanoma due to uneven nucleotide excision repair across the motif. Cell Reports 17(11):2865-2872

1. Health and Medical Research Fund (2023-2025) - Nanostring nCounter expression profiling of endogenous transposable elements as a biomarker of prognosis in colorectal cancer (PI, HKD$1.5M)
2. Mainland-Hong Kong Joint Funding Scheme (2022-2024) - Rapid Long-Read Profiling of Genomic Structural Variants To Improve The Clinical Stratification of ALL (PI, HKD$1.1M)
3. General Research Fund (2021-2023) - Using somatic mutational landscape to resolve the origin of hepatocellular carcinoma at the single cell level (PI, HKD$1.2M)
4. Research Impact Fund (2021-2024) - Development and applications of a driver-dependent tumor organoid biobank for translational liver cancer research (Co-PI, HKD$4.1M)
5. Collaborative Research Fund (2020-2023) - Integrative Chemical Biology Approaches to Decipher Histone Marks on H3K79 (Co-PI, HKD$ 6.5M)
6. National Health and Medical Research Council Project Grant (2017-2019) - The role of somatic mutations in CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF) binding sites in cancer (PI: AUD$371,000)

1. Cancer Researcher of the Year - Cure Cancer Australia Foundation (2016)
2. Future Fellow - Australian Research Council (2014)
3. Early Career Development Fellow - Cancer Institute NSW (2012)
4. Vice-Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellow - University of NSW (2011)
5. Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow - Irish Research Council (2007)

• Jayne Barbour (Postdoc)
• Kornelia Gładysz (KCL-HKU joint PhD)
• Becca Li (PhD)
• Mark Yang (PhD)
• Charles Lau (PhD)
• Yucan Chen (PhD)
• Sojung Lee (MPhil)
• Eunjeong Yang (Research Assistant)
• Amos Lo (Technician)
• Lijie Zhong (Technician)