Biography
Dr. Han received a Ph.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison, and completed her Postdoctoral training with Dr. Bob Desimone at MIT, and Drs. Tirin Moore and Richard Tsien at Stanford University. Over the past decade, Dr. Han has trained 9 Ph.D. students, 5 postdoctoral fellows, and mentored over 70 undergraduate students for lab research. More than half of them are women or underrepresented minorities. She is currently mentoring 13 Ph.D. students, including one underrepresented minority and 8 women. She was awarded the Mentor of The Year award by Boston University Graduate Women in Science and Engineering. Dr. Han holds two granted patents with more pending and authored over 70 peer reviewed journal articles and conference proceedings. She and her students and postdoctoral trainees have given over 100 oral presentations. She has been recognized by many distinguished awards, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the NIH New Innovator Award, the Pew Scholarship, the DARPA Young Faculty Award, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship and the Helen Hay Whitney Fellowship.
Dr. Xue Han’s seminal contribution to the field of neuroengineering centers on the invention and application of high impact molecular neurotechnologies to probe brain dynamics. She played an instrumental role in the development of optogenetic silencing molecules archaerhodopsins and halorhodopsins, enabling temporal precise silencing of specific neurons, some of the most widely used molecular tools in neuroscience, in use by thousands of research groups. Her contribution to optogenetics was crucial in establishing the new field of optogenetics, a field now being widely regarded as having revolutionized neuroscience research. In addition to her breakthrough discovery of the now widely used optogenetic molecular reagents, Dr. Han developed many other innovative technologies, including novel voltage imaging tools, cell type specific gene therapy viral vectors, drug releasing DNA origamis and mucosal based blood brain barrier penetrating strategies. Parallel to her neurotechnology innovation effort, Dr. Han has discovered key insights on the neural network mechanisms of neurological and psychiatric disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease. Her current research focuses on inventing novel neurotechnologies and applying innovative approaches to probe the cellular and network mechanisms of brain disorders and brain stimulation therapies, with a goal of developing clinical biomarkers and a new generation of neuromodulation therapeutics.