Academic Staff

Dr Tan, Youhua, Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Dr. Tan obtained his Bachelor degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2005 from the University of Science and Technology of China and PhD degree in Biomedical Engineering in 2010 from City University of Hong Kong and University of Science and Technology of China, respectively. After completing the postdoctoral training in University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, he joined the Department of Biomedical Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University as tenure-track Assistant Professor in 2015 and promoted to be tenured Associate Professor in 2021. Dr. Tan’s research is to unveil the roles of mechanical cues in tumor metastasis and develop new mechanomedicine and mechanotargeting strategies. His research has demonstrated that: 1) microenvironmental softness elevates tumor cell stemness and tumor formation ability; 2) the softness/stiffness of tumor cells enhances/suppresses their self-renewal, tumorigenic, and metastatic potential; 3) the softness of malignant cancer stem cells can be harnessed in nanoparticle-based drug delivery for their specific elimination; 4) fluid shear stress in blood circulation eliminates the majority of circulating tumor cells while enhances the metastasis-initiating functions of the surviving cells; 5) the mechanical heterogeneity in the primary tumor instructs the metastatic tropism, where primary tumor cells in the soft/stiff niches metastasize to soft brain/stiff bone. The research findings have been published in a number of leading international journals, including Nature Materials, Nature Communications, Science Advances, Research, Oncogene, Nano Letters, Bioactive Materials, Acta Biomaterialia, Biophysical Journal, etc. His research has been supported by many external (HK$16 M) and internal (HK$7 M) grants. 

• Ph.D. in Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Sep 2005 – Jun 2010
• Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering, University of Science and Technology of China, China, Sep 2001 – Jun 2005
  

  Previous academic positions held:

• Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, Mar 2011 – Jun 2015
  
  

  Present academic position:

• Associate Professor (Tenured), Department of Biomedical Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, Jul 2021 – Present
• Assistant Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, Jul 2015 – June 2021