Asian Scientist Magazine: Watch the Future Unfold

Besides her day job as a biological engineering postdoc at MIT, Juliana M. Chan PhD ’10 has another mission—informing the world about Asian research and scientists. Her vehicle is an online magazine, Asian Scientist, which serves the scientific community from China to India to New Zealand. And there are MIT fingerprints all over it.

Earlier this month, Steven Mo ’10 interviewed Dr. David Ho, a pioneer in AIDS research for three decades and an alumnus of the MIT Health, Science, and Technology program. Professor Ho is pursuing multiple vaccine strategies, including two candidates in clinical trials.

In May, Chan interviewed Joi Ito, the newly appointed MIT Media Lab executive director on his move from serial Internet innovator to head of an unusual, albeit academic, enterprise that blends arts and sciences. Find out how he plans to incorporate his Japanese heritage and wide-ranging interests at the Media Lab.

Other articles look at China’s space mission, shark conservation, 15 Asian scientists to watch, favorite TED talks, and seven wacky research stories.

Chan's day job is serious as well. She was lead author of a 2010 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences paper that described MIT-Harvard Medical School research that developed targeted nanoparticles that can cling to artery walls and slowly release medicine, an advance that may provide an alternative to drug-releasing stents.