Dr Gloria Lai received her Bachelor of Science in Chemistry (first class honours) and Doctor of Philosophy in Chemistry from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. During her studies, she was placed on the Dean’s Honours List and received a number of scholarships due to her academic excellence. 

Despite graduating from the Department of Chemistry, her research interests focus on microfluidics, applied biochemistry and synthetic biology. She has published relevant articles in international journals and books. Having double minors in Japanese Language and German, she is fluent in Japanese and speaks elementary German.

Prior to joining PolyU CPCE, Dr Lai was a scientist in the biotechnology industry and carried out research and development on epigenetics and systematic sequencing. She was a key member in leading clinical trial projects in early detection of cancer and gained valuable knowledge and experience in molecular biology and sequencing.