Yong Wan, PhD, is a School of Medicine Endowed Faculty Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Chemical Biology with a secondary appointment as professor in the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Emory University School of Medicine. Dr. Wan, a leading expert in posttranslational modifications and cancer biology, serves as director for basic research for the Glenn Family Breast Center at Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University.
Dr. Wan joined Emory from the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago. There, he served as professor of obstetrics and gynecology in the Division of Reproductive Science in Medicine, professor of pharmacology, and co-director of the Breast Cancer Program for the Robert Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center. Prior to joining Northwestern, he served on the faculty of the Department of Cell Biology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Hillman Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Education
Dr. Wan received his PhD from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. He completed his postdoctoral training as a Helen Hay Whitney fellow at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Titles & Roles
SOM Endowed Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Chemical Biology
Emory University School of Medicine
Professor, Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology
Emory University School of Medicine
Director for Basic Research, Glenn Family Breast Center
Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University
Research
Dr. Wan studies mechanisms of breast carcinogenesis and identifies novel targets for therapeutic development. Particularly, he seeks address how defects in the ubiquitin-proteasome system and other posttranslational modifiers such as protein methyltransferase, poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase and glycosyltransferase would result in deregulated tumor immune checkpoint function, genomic instability, and aberrant signaling that predispose otherwise normal cells to become cancerous tumor cells or promote cancer progression and metastasis.
Recent studies led by Dr. Wan have identified promising new strategies to improve the efficacy of immunotherapy in patients with triple-negative breast cancer.
Y Zhu, A Banerjee, P Xie, AA Ivanov, A Uddin, Q Jiao, JJ Chi, L Zeng, JY Lee, Y Xue, X Lu, M Cristofanilli, WJ Gradishar, CJ Henry, TW Gillespie, MA Bhave, K Kalinsky, H Fu, I Bahar, B Zhang, Y Wan