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About
Associate Professor Raymond CB Wong
Head of Cellular Reprogramming
Associate Professor Raymond CB Wong is a stem cell biologist and leads CERA’s cellular reprogramming research.
Associate Professor Raymond CB Wong
Head of Cellular Reprogramming
B.Biomed Sci (Hons), PhD
Associate Professor Raymond CB Wong is a Principal Investigator at CERA, the University of Melbourne and a Guest Professor at Shenzhen Eye Hospital in China.
He is a stem cell biologist specialising in cellular reprogramming, pluripotent stem cells and neural/retinal differentiation.
He completed his PhD in stem cell biology at Monash University and was awarded a California Institute of Regenerative Medicine Fellowship to pursue overseas postdoctoral training at the University of California Irvine (USA), and a Visiting Fellow Award to train at the National Institutes of Health (USA).
In 2013, A/Prof Wong joined CERA with the support of a Cranborne Foundation Fellowship and subsequently established the Cellular Reprogramming Unit with the support of a MAWA Fellowship and a NHMRC New Investigator Project Grant.
Currently, A/Prof Wong’s research focuses on understanding the genetic signals that define retinal cells, and using cell reprogramming and stem cell technologies to study and treat retinal diseases.
Key research questions
- How do we generate human retinal cells in the lab using stem cell technologies?
- Can we regenerate the retina to treat blindness caused by retinal degenerative diseases?
- Can we use new gene editing technology to develop gene therapy for inherited retinal diseases?
- What are the signals that support retinal cells for healthy vision?
Current projects
Selected publications
My team
Key collaborators
Funding and support
Fellowships/Awards
Current projects
- Using cell reprogramming to develop therapy to regenerate retinal cells.
- Understanding the genetic signals that define retinal cell identity.
- Develop new cell reprogramming methods and new biomaterials to generate human stem cells and neural/retinal cells.
- Using stem cells to generate disease models to better understand eye diseases.
- Develop new genetic correction technologies to treat inherited retinal diseases.
Selected publications
Urrutia-Cabrera, D., Liou, R., Lin, J., Shi, Y., Liu, K., Hung, S., Hewitt, A., Wang, P.Y., Wong, R. (2022) Combinatorial application of binary colloidal crystals and CRISPR activation to improve induced pluripotent stem cell differentiation into neurons. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2022, 14, 7, 8669-8679. (IF = 9.23)
Lukowski, S*, Lo, C.*, Sharov, A., Nguyen, Q., Fang, L., Hung, S., Zhu, L., Zhang, T., Grünert, U., Nguyen, T., Senabouth, A., Jabbari, J., Welby, E., Sowden, J., Waugh, H., Mackey, A., Pollock, G., Lamb, T., Wang, P.Y., Hewitt, A., Gillies, M., Powell, J., Wong, R. (2019) A single-cell transcriptome atlas of the adult human retina. EMBO Journal, 38(18): e100811. (IF = 11.6)
Fang, L., Hung, S., Yek, J., Nguyen, T., Khan, S., Hewitt, A., Wong, R. (2019) A simple cloning-free method to efficiently induce gene expression using CRISPR/Cas9. Molecular Therapy – Nucleic Acids, 14: 184-191, Mar 01, 2019. (IF = 8.9)
Hung, S., Khan, S., Lo, C., Hewitt, A., Wong, R. (2017) Drug discovery using induced pluripotent stem cell models of neurodegenerative and ocular diseases. Pharmacology and Therapeutics, 2017 Sep; 177:32-43. (IF = 12.3)
Wong, R., Lim, S., Hung, S., Jackson, S., Khan, S., Van Bergen, N., De Smit, E., Liang, H., Kearns, L., Clarke, L., Mackey, D., Hewitt, A., Trounce, I., Pebay, A. (2017) Mitochondrial replacement in an iPSC model of Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy. Aging, 9(4):1341-1350. (IF = 5.7)
See more publications
My team
- Roxanne Liou – PhD student, University of Melbourne
- Khandhan Nadarajan – Masters student, University of Melbourne
- Tu Nguyen – PhD student, University of Melbourne
- Daniel Urrutia – PhD student, University of Melbourne
Key collaborators
- Prof Keith Martin (CERA)
- Prof Alex Hewitt (CERA)
- Prof Robyn Guymer (CERA)
- A/Prof Chi Luu (CERA)
- A/Prof Guei-Sheung Liu (CERA)
- Prof Mark Daniel (CERA)
- Dr Tom Edwards (CERA)
- Dr Max Lim (St Vincent’s IMR)
- Prof David Mackey (Lions Eye Institute)
- A/Prof Fred Chen (Lions Eye Institute)
- Prof Mark Gillies (Save Sight/ Uni Sydney)
- Prof Damien Harkin (QUT)
- Prof George Wang (Chinese Academy of Science, China)
- Prof Guo Ping (Shenzhen Eye Hospital, China)
- Prof Antonio Del Sol Mesa (LCSB, Luxembourg)
- A/Prof Jonathan Loh (A*Star, Singapore)
- A/Prof Hagen Tilgner (Weill Cornell, USA)
Funding and support
- NHMRC
- National Stem Cell Foundation of Australia
- Mito Foundation
- Retina Australia
- Vision Australia
- The Ophthalmic Research Institute of Australia
- The Kel and Rosie Day Foundation
- Centre for Eye Research Australia
- Universtity of Melbourne
- Bayer
Fellowships/Awards
- CIRM Post-doctoral Fellowship, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, USA (2008)
- NIH Visiting Fellow Award, National Institutes of Health, USA (2011)
- Cranbourne Fellowship, Peggy & Leslie Cranbourne Foundation, Australia (2013)
- ACES-SVHM Bionics Award for Excellence in iPSC Modelling, ARC Centre of Excellence for Science & St Vincent’s Hospital, Australia (2015)
- MAWA fellowship, Medical Advances Without Animals Trust, Australia (2016)
- Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Human Cell Atlas Meeting Travel Award (2019)
- Frontiers of Cellular Neuroscience Travel Award (2019)
- Bonn International Fellowship, University of Bonn, Germany (2021)
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