MIT World Speakers

Li-Huei Tsai

Li-Huei Tsai initially embarked on a veterinary career in her native Taiwan in 1983, after receiving the D.V.M. degree from National Chung Hsing University. She soon moved to the U.S. to earn an M.S. at the University of Wisconsin, followed by a Ph.D. from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. She then joined Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Massachusetts General Hospital for postdoctoral training in the area of cancer research and cell cycle regulation. She was appointed Assistant Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School in 1994, where she refocused her research on brain development. She was elected investigator of Howard Hughes Medical Institute in 1997, and promoted to Professor of Pathology in 2002.

A major research interest of the Tsai lab is the mechanism leading to neurodegenerative diseases associated with cognitive decline and dementia such as Alzheimer’s Disease. Recently, the Tsai lab has also made contributions to understanding the pathophysiology of neuropsychiatric disorders such as depression.

Tsai has won the Rita Allen Foundation Scholarship, Klingenstein Fellowship for Neurosciences, and Promising Investigator Award from Metropolitan Life Foundation.