WEBINAR INFORMATION
28 May 2026 (Thu)
25 June 2026 (Thu)
17 September 2026 (Thu)
TBC October 2026
TBC November 2026
TBC December 2026
Format : Online
The official language of the webinar is English.
Whilst every attempt has been made to ensure that all aspects of the summit announced will take place as scheduled, we reserve the right to make changes at any time should the need arise.
Exploring MagIC Microbiome Series
The MagIC Microbiome Webinar Series 2026 brings together global and regional experts to explore the cutting-edge intersection of the microbiome with health across the lifespan. Hosted by the InnoHK Microbiota I-Center (MagIC) — Hong Kong’s leading microbiome research hub — this series highlights our commitment to translating microbiome discoveries into personalized diagnostics, therapeutics, and improved health outcomes. Through four engaging virtual sessions, we aim to foster interdisciplinary dialogue, spark new collaborations, and advance understanding of the microbiome’s profound influence on human development and wellbeing.
Who should attend?
Researchers and Scientists
Students
Medical Academic and Healthcare Professionals
Healthcare, Innovation, and Technology Start-Ups and Entrepreneurs
Exploring Area
Gut-Brain Axis
Healthy Aging with Microbiome
Early Life with Microbiome
Neurodevelopment and Microbiome
AI and Microbiome
SPONSORS
Gold Sponsor:
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Bio-Rad Laboratories is a global leader in life science research and clinical diagnostics, serving customers in more than 100 countries for over 70 years. The company develops innovative technologies, products, and services that advance scientific discovery, improve healthcare outcomes, and support laboratories in achieving reliable and accurate results. In the Life Science sector, Bio-Rad provides a comprehensive portfolio of solutions for genomics, proteomics, cell biology, food safety, and molecular biology research. Its industry-leading technologies include Droplet Digital PCR (ddPCR™), real-time PCR systems, western blotting and imaging platforms, electrophoresis solutions, and high-performance reagents that empower researchers with precision, sensitivity, and reproducibility. In Clinical Diagnostics, Bio-Rad is recognized for its expertise in quality control, diabetes monitoring, blood typing, and autoimmune testing. The company’s quality assurance and laboratory informatics solutions help laboratories maintain compliance with international standards while ensuring confidence in patient testing results. Driven by innovation and scientific excellence, Bio-Rad Laboratories continues to support researchers, clinicians, and healthcare professionals in accelerating discoveries and improving lives worldwide.
Silver Sponsor:
Shenzhen Gnotobio Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (founded in 2019) is a National High-Tech Enterprise specializing in germ-free animal models and experimental services. Licensed for both the production and use of germ-free animals, we operate two major facilities in Dongguan and Hefei, totaling over 5,000 m². This "Pearl River Delta - Yangtze River Delta" dual-center network ensures comprehensive nationwide coverage. Gnotobio core services include: Germ-free & SPF Mice: Providing strains like C57BL/6J, BALB/C, and nude mice, alongside breeding, colony maintenance, and rapid expansion. Specialized CRO Services: Offering standardized Fecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT), disease modeling, and drug efficacy evaluation using germ-free platforms. Custom Genetically Modified Mice: Expertise in gene knockout, knock-in, transgenic mice, and rat models. BSL-2 Laboratory Support: Delivering safe and reliable cell, molecular, and in vivoresearch involving hazardous pathogens and recombinant microbes. Gnotobio is committed to providing reliable, high-quality solutions for biomedical research.
Dr. Peng Ye
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Dr. Ye Peng is a microbiome scientist specializing in the gut microbiome’s role in early-life health and disease. He completed his PhD at the University of Hong Kong and received postdoctoral training at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where his cohort studies revealed how perinatal exposures shape gut microbiota development and influence childhood obesity, food sensitization, immune responses to vaccines and colonization resistance against AMR bacteria. Dr. Peng’s interdisciplinary research integrates multi-omics, epidemiology, and machine learning to advance microbiome science and combat antimicrobial resistance. His long-term vision focuses on defining “healthy microbiomes” and translating discoveries into personalized therapies to improve health from early childhood to aging populations.
First Impressions & Repair: Early Life Microbiome and Gut Repair Strategies
Moderator
Speaker
Speaker
Dr. Megan Kennedy
University of Chicago,
US
Megan Kennedy completed her bachelor’s degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University under senior thesis advisor Dr. Andrea Graham. She then worked with Dr David Relman at Stanford University for two years before joining the MD/PhD program at the University of Chicago. She received her PhD in 2023 in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology under advisors Dr. Eugene Chang and Dr. Joy Bergelson, studying the ecological dynamics, stability, and resilience of the gut microbiome using mouse models. She expects to graduate from the University of Chicago with her MD in June of this year, and will be joining the University of California, San Francisco for residency in General Surgery.
Jose C. Clemente is a Professor in the Department of Genetics and Genomic Sciences and Co-Director of the Microbiome Translational Center at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, NY (USA). He received his B.Sc. in Computer Science from the University of Seville (Spain), and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Bioinformatics from the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (Japan). He did his postdoctoral training at the National Institute of Genetics (Japan), under Dr. Takashi Gojobori, and at the University of Colorado Boulder (USA), under Dr. Rob Knight. His research is focused on the development of experimental and computational methods to characterize the microbiome. His group has made seminal contributions to understand the microbiome of human populations and its relation to immune diseases and has pioneered the use of microbial interventions to modulate the microbiome therapeutically. He has published over 120 articles and is currently an associate editor of the journal npj Biofilms and Microbiomes.
Prof. Jose Clemente
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, US
25 JUN 2026 20:00 HKT
Prof. Su Qi
Gut-Brain Axis
Moderator
Speaker
Speaker
Prof. Lulu Xu
Prof. Justin Lee
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Dr. Su Qi is an assistant professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is an expert in molecular biology, neuroscience and bioinformatics with deep expertise in the gut-brain axis. As a lead or corresponding author, Dr. Su has published original research in prestigious high-impact journals, including Nature Microbiology, Cell Host & Microbe, The Lancet Infectious Diseases, Nature Communications, and Gut. His significant contributions to the field have been recognized through numerous accolades, such as the Hong Kong Young Scientist Award and inclusion in the World's Top 2% Scientists list. Furthermore, he has secured competitive funding from GRF, HMRF, NSFC, SMRF and others. He actively serves the academic community as an editorial board member for iMeta and a reviewer for leading journals, including Nature Medicine, Nature Microbiology, and Gut.
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Yeong Yeh LEE, MD, Ph.D., FACP, FRCP, FACG, FAMM, AGAF, FASc is Professor of Medicine and Consultant of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Internal Medicine at Universiti Sains Malaysia. He is currently the Adjunct Professor at Universitas Airlangga. He has authored more than 340 papers in high-impact journals including Gastroenterology and Gut, several book chapters and textbooks, and listed in the Stanford’s Top 2% in the World in their respective field (citation impact in a single year). JCI Malaysia awarded him the Outstanding Young Malaysian Award in 2015 and the Top Research Scientist of Malaysia by the Academy of Sciences Malaysia in 2018. He is senior editor of a number of journals including the Malaysian Journal of Medical Sciences. He is Past President of the Malaysian Society of Gastroenterology & Hepatology (MSGH), Past Scientific Chair of Asia Pacific Digestive Week (APDW) 2021 and committee member of numerous international societies including the World Gastroenterology Organization.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Zhilu Xu, Lulu, is a project leader at Microbiota I-Center. Her research focuses on the gut microbiome in relation to obesity and metabolic diseases. She investigates multi-omics changes in these conditions, seeking to identify specific microbes and metabolites that promote metabolic health and understand their roles and underlying mechanisms through in vitro, in vivo, and human clinical trials. Furthermore, she examines the effects of gut microbiome manipulation techniques such as prebiotics, probiotics, and fecal microbiota transplantation on the composition and function of the human gut microbiome. She received her PhD in medical sciences from the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2019. Her work has led to over 20 scientific publications and several licensed patents. Her inventions have led to royalty income and an award-winning synbiotic formulation, demonstrating her ability to translate research into innovative products and technologies.
On-Demand Library
27 JUN 2024
Microbiome in Early Life
Prof. Jakob Stokholm & Prof Lin Zhang joined us for an insightful webinar, where they explored how the microbiome in pregnancy and early life was shaped and affected by environmental factors, and whether these factors could change the risk of childhood disease.
Keynote Speech by
Prof. Jakob Stokholm
University of Copenhagen
Topic
Early life environment, microbiome maturation and the risk of disease in childhood
Keynote Speech by
Prof. Lin Zhang
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Topic
Early life microbiome from the MOMMY Cohort: Lessons from COVID-19 pandemic
Jakob Stokholm, MD, is an associate professor at COPSAC and University of Copenhagen. Jakob Stokholm’s research area can be described as clinical translational research combining basic research methodologies and bioinformatics approaches mainly from the microbiology field with clinical data from birth cohort studies. The research has especially contributed to the understanding of how the microbiome in pregnancy and early life is shaped, and affected by factors such as antibiotics and delivery mode, and whether these factors as well as the microbiome and virome can change risk of asthma and allergy. He is leading the microbiome group at COPSAC.
Lin Zhang is Assistant Professor at the Department of Medicine and Therapeutics, Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care (by courtesy) of the Faculty of Medicine and Project Leader in Microbiota I-Center (MagIC) at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She began her research in gut microbiota and host interactions a decade ago, after obtaining her PhD from School of Biomedical Sciences of CUHK in 2013. Dr. Zhang joined the CUHK as faculty in 2017 and has published over 120 full scientific articles (28 of them as the first, co-first or corresponding author) and 3 book chapters, including papers in Annals of Oncology, Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy, Cell Host & Microbes, Gut, EClinicalMedicine, Autophagy. Dr Zhang also has assisted in the InnoHK Health initiative for the MagIC Center for Microbiota Medicine and is the project leader in Early Life Microbiome. Additionally, she has been invited to deliver > 20 lectures, including Digestive Disease Week (DDW) 2023, 2024, Microbiome Medicine Program at University of Chicago 2023, and UNSW Medicine & Health, St George/Sutherland, Research in Progress Meetings 2022.
