Speaker Profile
Wei  Yan

Wei Yan MD, PhD

Physiology and Biophysics
Reno, Nevada, United States of America

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Dr. Wei Yan obtained his M.D. from China Medical University in 1990 and his Ph.D. from University of Turku, Finland in 2000. After post-doc training at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, Dr. Yan started his own lab in the University of Nevada School of Medicine in 2004. Dr. Yan is currently Professor of Physiology, Molecular and Cellular Biology. He has published >80 peer-reviewed research articles, many of which appeared in high impact journals, including Nature Genetics, PNAS, Nucleic Acids Research, RNA, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Developmental Biology, etc. Dr. Yan received numerous prestigious awards including the 2009 Nevada High Education System Regents’ Rising Researcher Award, the 2009 Young Investigator Award of the Society for the Study of Reproduction (SSR), the 2012 Young Andrologist Award of the American Society of Andrology (ASA) and the 2013 Nevada Healthcare Hero Award for Research and Technology. Dr. Yan is now a standing member of the NIH CMIR study section and an editorial board member of three international journals on Reproductive Biology (Biology of Reproduction, Molecular and Cellular Endocrinology & Asian Journal of Andrology). He also serves as an Associate Editor for Biology and Reproduction and an Academic Editor for PLoS ONE. Dr. Yan’s research interests lie in the regulation of gametogenesis with an emphasis on spermiogenesis. He believes that the malfunction of late spermiogenesis-specific genes, either through genetic or epigenetic mechanisms, is involved in many forms of sperm defects in idiopathic male infertility patients. Since these late spermiogenesis-specific genes are unique to male haploid germ cells and their disruptions rarely trigger germ cell depletion within the testis, he proposes that these genes and gene products are excellent male non-hormonal contraceptive targets. His lab is currently working on coding and noncoding genes that control spermatogenesis, and epigenetic contribution of sperm to fertilization, early embryonic development and adult disease etiology.