Dr. Wong earned his Ph.D. in Physiology from the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2009. He received postdoctoral training at Stanford University before becoming a member of Houston Methodist Research Institute in 2013. Dr. Wong has published over 40 research papers and review articles in the area of vascular medicine and biology in such journals as Circulation Research, Cell Metabolism, Hypertension, Diabetes, Antioxidants & Redox Signaling, Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology, Cardiovascular Research, Journal of Hypertension, and Radiology. Dr. Wong has attended a number of international and regional conferences, and received 10 awards and prizes at these meetings. Dr. Wong was awarded the Young Investigator Award Finalist in American Heart Association Scientific Sessions. He is frequently invited to review manuscripts for 25 international scientific journals, including American Journal of Physiology, Kidney International, Biochemical Pharmacology, and PLoS One. Furthermore, he is currently an editorial board member for Food and Nutritional Sciences, Dataset Papers in Medicine, Vascular Medicine, and World Journal of Pharmacology. Dr. Wong has also received funding support, including an American Heart Association Postdoctoral Fellowship (12POST8830020), an American Heart Association Scientist Development Grant (13SDG15800004), and a National Institute of Health Jump Start Award (NHLBI PCBC Jump Start Award).

Dr. Wong’s research is to identify novel determinants governing endothelial specification from pluripotent stem cells. At present, the methods used to differentiate human induced pluripotent stem cells into endothelial cells are empirical because an understanding of the determinants of endothelial lineage is limited (Please see his review on this topic: Wong et al., Circulation Research, 2012.) Using a systematic and mechanistic approach, he is identifying novel determinants of endothelial lineages using interspecies heterokaryons (a stable fusion product of two different cell types) and will characterize the role of these novel genes in the directed differentiation to an endothelial phenotype.