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Prof.
Michael M.C. Lai is an internationally recognized expert on
coronaviruses and several other RNA viruses, including hepatitis C virus
and hepatitis delta virus. He is currently a Distinguished Professor of
Molecular Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Southern California
School of Medicine and has also held the position of Vice President of
Academia Sinica in Taiwan since July 1, 2003. He
is currently heading the National Task Force on SARS-coronavirus research
in Taiwan.
He is noted for the numerous contributions to the understanding of the
replication and pathogenesis of coronaviruses over the past thirty years.
He has more than 200 peer-reviewed publications plus more than 50 review
articles on various subjects including coronaviruses, hepatitis C and Delta
viruses.
Academia
Sinica is a premier research
institution in Taiwan. It includes six life sciences institutes, which
study various human, animal and plant model systems and human diseases.
Several of these institutes have been actively involved in SARS coronavirus
research as part of the national task force on SARS research. Dr. Lai is in
charge of coordinating various research institutes, including Center for
Disease Control, National Taiwan University
and other universities, National Health Research Institute, and several
hospitals in Taiwan
in SARS research. This research consortium has expertise in virology,
immunology, epidemiology, clinical sciences and drug development. In
addition, it has an excellent collection of well-characterized clinical
samples.
Selected
publications of Partner 15:
- Lai M.M.C., Baric R.S.,
Makino S., Keck J.G., Egbert K., Leibowitz
J., and Stohlman S.A. 1985. Recombination between nonsegmented
RNA genomes of murine coronaviruses.
J. Virol. 56:449-456.
- Makino S., Stohlman S. A.,
and Lai M.M.C. 1986. Leader sequence of murine
coronavirus mRNAs can be freely reassorted:
evidence for the role of free leader RNA in transcription. Proc.
Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 83:4204-4208.
- Taylor D.R., Shi S.T., Romano
P.R., Barber G.N., and Lai M.M.C. 1999. Inhibition of the
interferon-inducible protein kinase PKR by
hepatitis virus E2 protein. Science 285:107-110.
- Shi S.T., Huang P.Y., Li
H.P., and Lai M.M.C. 2000. Heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein
A1 regulates RNA synthesis of a cytoplasmic virus. EMBO J.
19:4701-4711.
- Macnaughton T.B.,
and Lai M.M.C. 2002. Rolling circle replication of hepatitis delta
virus RNA is carried out by two different cellular RNA
polymerases. J. Virol. 76:3920-3927.
Prof.
Dr. M.M.C. Lai
michlai@gate.sinica.edu.tw
Dr.
Shiou-Hwei Yeh
shyeh@ha.mc.ntu.edu.tw
Prof. Dr. Pei-Jer
Chen
peijer@ha.mc.ntu.edu.tw
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