Chi Huey Wong

Biography

Wong received his BS and MS degrees from National Taiwan University in Taipei, Taiwan.

In 1982, Wong earned his PhD degree in Chemistry from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in the United States, where he carried out research under the supervision of George M. Whitesides. He continued on as a postdoctoral researcher in the same laboratory after Whitesides had relocated to Harvard University.

In 1983, he joined the faculty at Texas A&M University, before moving to Scripps in 1989 as Ernest W. Hahn Chair in Chemistry.

As a pioneer in glycoscience research, Wong has developed the first enzymatic method for the large-scale synthesis of oligosaccharides and the first programmable automated synthesis of oligosaccharides. These methods have been used to solve major problems and create new opportunities in carbohydrate-mediated biological recognition and disease control. Of particular significance is his development of carbohydrate-based vaccines for the treatment of breast cancer and infectious diseases and glycan microarrays for the high-throughput analysis of protein-carbohydrate interaction. Overall, research in the Wong lab encompasses a broad spectrum of bioorganic and synthetic chemistry. Development of small molecules targeting proteins and RNA has been performed to investigate how small molecules interact with biologically important molecules and in turn, learn more about the function of those molecules. Development of both synthetic and bioorganic strategies is also paramount to his research. Programmable one-pot reactions are being developed for the synthesis of complex oligosaccharides and glycan arrays and complement his chemo-enzymatic strategies for the assembly of homogeneous glycoproteins with well-defined glycan structure and other biologically active molecules.

Since 2003, Wong became the founding director of The Genomics Research Center of Academia Sinica. He was later appointed by the President of the Republic of China to head Academia Sinica, the national academy of science in Taiwan. He took the office on 19 October 2006. He was awarded the F.A. Cotton Medal for Excellence in Chemical Research of the American Chemical Society in 2008, The International Enzyme Engineering Award in 1999, the US Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award in 2000, The American Chemical Society Claude S. Hudson Award in Carbohydrate Chemistry in 1999, the Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry in 2005, the Arthur C. Cope Award in 2012, and the Wolf Prize in Chemistry in 2014.

In May 2016 Wong stepped down from his position as head of Academia Sinica among allegations of insider trading regarding the Taiwanese startup pharmaceutical company OBI Pharma, which had developed a treatment for breast cancer the company announced that the treatment had shown mixed results in a clinical trial, falling short of its primary goal of progression-free survival but showing some benefit for certain patients. The stock price immediately slumped. Wong was later quoted in Taiwanese media as saying the company still had promise.

Soon afterward, Taiwanese news outlets started reporting allegations that Wong's daughter, artist Yuh-Shioh Wong, had bought shares in the company in 2012, a year before it was publicly listed, but had then sold some of those shares shortly before the trial results announcement. When the scandal broke, Wong was in the United States on business. On 31 March he tendered his resignation to Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou, who rejected it. He was later indicted on corruption charges in January 2017. Following the indictment, the Control Yuan voted to impeach Wong in July.