Kevin SW TAN

Biography

Kevin SW TAN is Associate Professor, Head, and Dean’s Chair of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, National University of Singapore. He is also Vice-Dean, Graduate Studies, at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine. His curiosity for parasites originated from his graduate student days at NUS and blossomed during his postdoctoral stint at The Rockefeller University, New York City. He is relieved to be awarded tenure in 2011, and can now spend more time on social issues, such as public science education. Kevin’s research focuses on understanding how parasites commit suicide and exploiting such knowledge to trigger death mechanisms as an anti-parasite strategy. He is also interested in the problem of drug resistance and his team has developed new ways to find drugs that overcome resistance. More recently, his team has embarked on projects focusing on the role of single cell eukaryotes (SCEs) in the host microbiome. He hopes that the research from his team will accelerate the finding of new cures for parasitic diseases.