Hovy Wong

@

✨ GCNI Symposium 2025 🧠 Mark Your Calendars!

📅 Date & Time: December 4-5, 2025 (9:00 AM - 6:00 PM)
📍 Venue: LT3, G/F, YIA, CUHK

🎟️ Register Here: cloud.itsc.cuhk.edu.hk/webform/view...
🔗 Learn More:
gcni.cuhk.edu.hk/gcni-symposi...

@cuhk-gcni.bsky.social
@hovywong.bsky.social

Looking for talented PhD applicants (who graduated with distinction from top universities) to nominate for Fellowships! Please get in touch if you'd like to mess around with lasers, optics, electrophysiolgy and multi-omics to solve mysteries of the brain.
www.cuhk.edu.hk/gcni/hovywong/

It's taken a while, but finally here is our lab website! 🧠 🕸️
www.cuhk.edu.hk/gcni/hovywong/

We'll be hosting Prof. Simon Chen @schenlabottawa.bsky.social
from UOttawa at The Chinese Uni. of Hong Kong. He'll share with us his fascinating work on inhibitory neuron in motor learning. Please come & join us, all are welcome!
📅 23 Sep 2025 (Tue)
⏰ 16:00–17:30
🚏Room 211, C. W. Chu College, CUHK

These lovely neurons made it to the journal cover!
www.nature.com/nprot/volume...
With @alannawatt.bsky.social and @pjsjostrom.bsky.social in @natprot.nature.com.

Thank you Cahir!

Delighted to share that I'm awarded the @ibroorg.bsky.social (IBRO) Rising Stars Award 2025! Look forward to bridging Asia-Pacific and international neuroscience, with the common goals of demystifying the brain & targeting brain disorders! 🧠

Thank you IBRO for the recognition and all my colleagues!

Now out in @elife.bsky.social with an excellent Insight preview commentry by Ikuko Smith! Enjoy🙂
Commentary: elifesciences.org/articles/107...
Article: elifesciences.org/reviewed-pre...

The Handbook of Ephys is out!! Thanks to the editors!
doi.org/10.1142/14331

"How to Patch a Cell"- we provide a quick-start guide for people who are fresh to whole-cell patching.

"Multiple Whole-Cell Recordings"- we go into details of obtaining quality recordings of dual- to 4-cell patch.

Enjoy!😃

We still have open Research Assistant positions in the lab! If you are interested, please get in touch.

This work was spearheaded by my talented fellow postdoc colleague, Aurore Thomazeau, and led by @pjsjostrom.bsky.social!
(4/4)

3) These provide unique opportunities for targeting the signaling pathway in pathological conditions with altered LTD
(3/4)

This is special because:
1) It doesn't require the typical function of the memory receptor to pass ions into the brain cells
2) This happens in the "speaker neuron", rather than in the "listener neuron" where the memory receptor is traditionally thought to reside
(2/4)

"Long-Term Depression (LTD)" weakens the strength of brain connections and is a cellular mechanism involved in memory removal. In our new preprint, we found that the "memory receptor" (NMDAR) signals through the JNK2/STX1a pathway to mediate LTD!

Check out our paper: t.co/84pP49WvfZ
(1/4)

We thank our handling editor @rosyf.bsky.social and reviewers, who have been extremely helpful in improving the paper!

This method was key to uncovering the role of local axonal protein synthesis in information processing (doi.org/10.1016/j.ne...). It provides a tool to uncover other underexplored compartmentalized signaling in the brain and will offer us fresh info on disease targeting. (3/3)

Traditionally, it's been hard to survey the "speaker neuron" and so the listener neuron is often thought to be primary determiner. Here, we present a strategy. Using a femtosecond laser as an optical knife, microsurgery with µm precision can be performed to pinpoint the axonal contribution. (2/3)

Our latest paper (@alannawatt.bsky.social & @pjsjostrom.bsky.social) is out in Nature Protocols! (rdcu.be/d9f3v)

When a conversation goes wrong, do we always blame the listener? But then when a brain connection goes wrong, doesn't it seem unfair to always blame the "listener" neuron? (1/3)

RA ad: cuhk.taleo.net/careersectio...

Postdoc ad: cuhk.taleo.net/careersectio...

We play with lasers and optics, we record electrical signals and image subcellular processes in living neurons, we do omics analysis to understand comprehensive molecular landscapes, and we develop cutting-edge technologies to push the field!

My lab at CUHK (QS: 36th) is hiring!
We are looking for motivated Research Assistants, PhD students (urgent🚨) and Postdocs who love solving problems. To understand the mysterious brain, we use a range of fun techniques. Please spread the word and get in touch if you are interested!

Thank you Srikanth!

Will miss my postdoc lab and awesome lab mates loads, Montreal & @mcgill.ca will always have a special place in my heart! Also sad to be leaving the amazing @canacn.bsky.social neuroscience community, but will hopefully be welcomed back to attend the fun CAN meetings 😃

Can't ever thank my mentors enough, esp. Nancy Ip, Christine Holt & @pjsjostrom.bsky.social. Plus many unofficial ones like Bill Harris, @alannawatt.bsky.social & Keith Murai. I've learnt so much from the wisdom in their science perspectives, and how important kindness is in mentoring & research.

The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Excited to share that I'll be starting my own lab at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (www.cuhk.edu.hk).
What a journey! 🇭🇰 -> 🇬🇧 -> 🇭🇰 -> 🇬🇧 -> 🇨🇦 -> 🇭🇰

Will recruit keen RAs, students & postdocs to do fun 🧠science tgt, involving lots of lasers, electrophysiology & imaging methods. Ads coming soon!

Stunning!

Frontiers | The diversity of the plasticitome The plasticity of synaptic connections is critical to the functioning of local circuits as it is thought to underlie information processing and storage in th...

We recently launched a new Frontiers Research Topic called "The Diversity of the Plasticitome", please check it out! By 'we', I mean myself, Christina Chou, Hyungju Park, Serena Dudek, and Clive Bramham. www.frontiersin.org/research-top...

Thanks buddy!

Finding brain connections is slow. So we present Optomapping!

With laser-activation of single inputs + postsynaptic patch, 100s of connections can be rapidly examined.

Led by @pjsjostrom.bsky.social‘s long vision, spearheaded by the talented & persistent @christina-c.bsky.social. 🥂to the PJS team!

Visited Yellowknife and the Rockies on our last trip before leaving Canada - absolutely stunning!