Vy Wien Lai

I am a DPhil student researching intestinal dysfunction in premature infants with necrotising enterocolitis (NEC). My work focuses on using spatial transcriptomics to map cellular organisation and spatial interactions within the gut, with the aim of uncovering the cellular and molecular mechanisms that drive NEC.

I graduated from Imperial College London in 2021 with a BSc in Medical Biosciences and an MSc in Genes, Drugs and Stem Cells. Following this, I worked as a Research Assistant in Professor Allan Bradley’s lab at the University of Cambridge, where I contributed to efforts to humanise the mouse T cell receptor. This work later formed the foundation of the biotech spin-out T-Therapeutics Ltd. During this time, I became increasingly interested in computational approaches to biology and recognised the value of interdisciplinary communication in research. This led me to join the Antanaviciute Group, where I now work at the intersection of single-cell technologies, spatial transcriptomics and multi-omics.