Ann-Shyn Chiang

Tsing Hua Distinguished Chair Professor
National Tsing Hua University
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Dr. Ann-Shyn Chiang received BS from National Chung Hsin University, MS from National Taiwan University in Taiwan, and earned PhD in Entomology from Rutgers University, USA in 1990.  His research specialty focuses on brain science, connectomics, neurogenetics, behaviors, and bioimaging.  Ann-Shyn joined Department of Life Science, National Tsing Hua University and quickly being promoted as professor (1997), then he took sabbatical to study Drosophila memory at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (2001) and became adjunct International Faculty of Kavli Institute for Brain and Mind (KIBM) at the University of California, San Diego (2011).  

Ann-Shyn made major contribution to understanding of memory formation using a connectomics approach, and he was elected as an Academician of Academia Sinica (2014) and The World Academy of Science Fellow (2016).  He reconstructed a brain-wide wiring diagram in Drosophila (the New York Times reported this discovery as the first step toward mapping human brain) and published the first Cell (2007) paper from Taiwanese scientists.  Guiding by this connectomics map, his team discovered that long-term memory formation requires new protein synthesis only in few brain neurons and published the first full article in Science (2012) from Taiwanese scientists.  

Ann-Shyn has published original scientific discovery in some 150 SCI journal articles and received many awards including Outstanding Research Award, National Science Council, Outstanding Scholar Award, Foundation for the Advancement of Outstanding Scholarship, Academic Award of Ministry of Education, Outstanding Contributions in Science and Technology of Executive Yuan, TWAS Prize in Biology, and National Chair Award of Ministry of Education.  His major contribution in pioneering tissue clearance and digital imaging has facilitated scientists to seeing through biological tissues and retrieving big data from anatomic, cellular, and molecular features for innovative functional and behavior characterization.

Speech title & Synopsis

Nanoimaging the Brain Connectomes