Herman Fung, Ph.D.

Herman Fung earned his bachelor's and honors degree in biochemistry from the University of Sydney, Australia. There, he trained with Jacqueline Matthews in the characterization of enzymes and transcription factors by X-ray crystallography, biochemistry and biophysics.

Supported by a Wellcome Trust fellowship, he moved to the University of York, United Kingdom, to pursue a Ph.D. under the mentorship of Fred Antson and Christoph Baumann. His work focused on understanding how bacteriophages package their DNA, using X-ray crystallography, cryo-electron microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and total internal reflection microscopy.

Joining Julia Mahamid and Christoph Mueller at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Germany, Fung began to study eukaryotic genome architecture inside cells using cryo-electron tomography. Driven by the need for better technology, he co-developed tools for correlative and automated focused ion beam milling and labeling strategies for protein localization. Using cryo-electron microscopy, he also identified a regulatory mechanism for ribosomal RNA transcription. During this time, Fung was supported by an EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowship and a German Research Foundation Priority Program Independence Accelerator Award.

In his lab, Fung continues to explore the mechanistic detail of protein-nucleic acid systems in cells by combining and developing structural cell biology tools. He is particularly interested in understanding how the 3-D structure of human chromatin impacts gene expression and development.