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Dr. David Ng
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Director and Senior Instructor
Advanced Molecular Biology Laboratory (AMBL), UBC
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| Professional Activities |
I am responsible for the ongoing supervision of the Advanced Molecular Biology Laboratory (AMBL) at The University of British Columbia. This is the educational arm of the Michael Smith Laboratories, first conceived by the late Nobel Laureate, Dr. Michael Smith to provide science learning experiences for both general public and scientific communities. This includes a bifocal mandate to train scientists (university students and faculty) in areas of my specific expertise, and to inform the public at large on the societal, cultural, corporate, political, economic, and ethical nuances of the general sciences, and life sciences in particular.
As I have had the opportunity to interact and participate in a research intensive group that represents a wide and diverse range of prominent scientific fields, I find that I have become very well versed in many multidisciplinary aspects of science. This knowledge base has been invaluable to the development of my university courses, as well as outreach, and professional initiatives. As well, I have have been privileged to work with wide range of different audiences, including those from the high school community, business community, environmental community, media representatives, political circles, students in Third World contexts, and even clergy (on stem cells no less) - all with the result of my gaining valuable perspective and insight into the issues at hand.
My predecessor, with a strong mandate from Dr. Michael Smith began work on initiating an outreach program aimed primarily at high school teachers. At this early stage, the program was generally limited to a few workshops held annually to invited teachers from the lower mainland. Upon arriving in 1999, I saw this program as an excellent opportunity to promote enthusiasm in science and to increase public awareness of the possible impact that this science will create on everyday life. This is an especially important goal given the explosion of genetic technologies in only the last 5 years. In this respect, AMBL has taken the charge at continuing to provide excellent, accessible and free learning experiences to the general public and particularly to the high school communities, culminating in the provision of direct laboratory experiences to over 3000 high school students each year.
In the last year and a half, I have been focusing some of my efforts in becoming an established writer with projects that include magazine publications, a non-fiction science book project, as well as a literary science writing website The Science Creative Quarterly. The online project, in particular, has been doing remarkably well and currrently represents about 2% of all website traffic coming into UBC. It is hoped that these ventures will continue to increase my public role as a science educator.
During the last year or so, I have been a project co-leader in a UBC wide educational project that seeks to bridge conceptual gaps between Arts and Science audiences. Called "Terry," this project can be summarized as follows:
"The Terry project is a joint initiative of the University of British Columbia’s Faculties of Arts and Science with a strong collaboration with VP Students Porfolio (as well as many others including those from groups as diverse as UBC Office of Sustainability and UBC Community Affairs). Its primary mission is to educate members of the UBC community (notably undergraduate students) on the pressing global issues of our time. This has encompassed a website, design of a future interdisciplinary course addressing global issues, and delivery of our speaker’s series showcasing high profile (and engaging) academics, cognoscenti, and proactive members of our global community. By creating a synergistic forum that addresses topics such as climate change, sustainability, GMOs and AIDS, we hope to stress the importance of multi-disciplinary learning, thus inspiring students to actively pursue university educations that will assist them in developing and promoting just, civil, and sustainable societies throughout the world."
This project has been wonderful for me, in that it has enabled me to form relations with colleagues from a wide range of Faculty of Arts disciplines, including History, Philosophy, Creative Writing, Architecture, and Political Science. In addition, my involvement has allowed me to further develop science expertise outside my geneticist hat.
Finally, I should note that AMBL is at a stage where it is interested in pursuing educational projects that would have an impact in aiding towards reaching the U.N. Millenium Development Goals. In that regard, I invite anyone or any group with similar interests or intentions to chat. |
| Research Interests |
Those would be molecular genetics, especially where this technology can interplay with less conventional subjects (i.e. anthropology, art, history, literature); and science education.
But maybe more interesting is a slightly less formal take on me:
Name and Residence: David Ng, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Born: December 27th, 1969, Kingston Upon Thames, London, England.
Education: B.Sc. and Ph.D. in Science (Immunology). University of British Columbia.
Career history: pretty much academic all the way and at the same University as well. Vancouver is a difficult city to leave.
Hobbies/personal interests: Teaching and getting people excited about science (what can I say - I love my job). I'm an outdoor enthusiast and dabble in hiking, climbing and canoeing - despite being fairly adept at these sorts of things, I think the Eco-Challenge is for crazy people. I'm also a fairly good guitarist, although apparently not good enough to make copious amounts of money from it. I paint when our residence needs artwork. I'm an avid reader and am particularly fond of non-fiction books. I belong to a reading group and am fairly notorious for accidentally picking titles that get poor reviews within the group. I love to travel and am lucky enough to have a job that presents a lot of opportunity to do so. Next trip - probably a Disney Cruise, which only makes sense when you realize that we once took a 10 month old to the European Alps. And how can I forget,.. family time with my wife Kate and my kids Hannah and Ben.
If not teaching, what would you be doing? I'd probably be doing more research. I have a very strong background in an area known as signal transduction, which is a big part of cancer, immunology and neuroscience research these days.
General description of myself: Two words - low maintenance.
How would you describe what you actually do for a living? Taken to its simplest form, I get people to think harder, and try to make them smile at the same time.
What were your favourite films last year? Didn't see too many films last year. Never really was a hardcore movie enthusiast, although I can say that my favourite all time movie is Star Wars. Generally, I'm more of a music buff - favourite artist: Neil Finn hands down.
Do you watch the Sopranos? Not really, but just enough to know what it is. I often try to add pop-culture references in my lectures so it's important for me to stay abreast with these sorts of things. Lately my TV shows are Without a Trace, The Amazing Race, and after a hard day of work and looking after Hannah and Ben, I'm all over the sitcom format.
Comments: my friends and colleagues once voted me as "coolest geek." Not sure how I should take that. |
| Selected Publications |
2006
David Ng Concerning the President of the United States of America. DNA as a Magic 8 Ball Seed . (2006).
2005
David Ng Am I Everywhere? The Believer (Letters) . (2005).
David Ng Chapter titles from my Creationist textbook McSweeney's . (2005).
David Ng It's a lucky thing for stem-cell research that the following passages aren't in the Bible McSweeney's . (2005).
2004
David Ng Grimace Speaks to a Geneticist McSweeney's . (2004).
David Ng Von Trapp Children Speak to a Geneticist McSweeney's . (2004).
David Ng DNA and Nigeria: Survivor for Science Geeks Maisonneuve (9):. (2004).
Felberg J,Lefebvre DC,Lam M,Wang Y,Ng DH,Birkenhead D,Cross JL,Johnson P. Subdomain X of the kinase domain of Lck binds CD45 and facilitates dephosphorylation. J Biol Chem 279(5):3455-62. (2004).
1997
Ng DH,Jabali MD,Maiti A,Borodchak P,Harder KW,Brocker T,Malissen B,Jirik FR,Johnson P. CD45 and RPTPalpha display different protein tyrosine phosphatase activities in T lymphocytes. Biochem J 327867-76. (1997).
1996
Orchansky PL,Ng DH,Johnson P,Teh HS. Increase in the specific activity of p50csk in proliferating T cells correlates with decreased specific activity of p56lck and p59fyn and reduced phosphorylation of CD3 subunits. Mol Immunol 33(6):531-40. (1996).
Ng DH,Watts JD,Aebersold R,Johnson P. Demonstration of a direct interaction between p56lck and the cytoplasmic domain of CD45 in vitro. J Biol Chem 271(3):1295-300. (1996).
1995
Haidl ID,Ng DH,Rothenberger S,Johnson P,Jefferies WA. Detection of restricted isoform expression and tyrosine phosphatase activity of CD45 in murine dendritic cells. Eur J Immunol 25(12):3370-4. (1995).
Kitamura K,Maiti A,Ng DH,Johnson P,Maizel AL,Takeda A. Characterization of the interaction between CD45 and CD45-AP. J Biol Chem 270(36):21151-7. (1995).
Ng DH,Harder KW,Clark-Lewis I,Jirik F,Johnson P. Non-radioactive method to measure CD45 protein tyrosine phosphatase activity isolated directly from cells. J Immunol Methods 179(2):177-85. (1995).
Ng DH,Maiti A,Johnson P. Point mutation in the second phosphatase domain of CD45 abrogates tyrosine phosphatase activity. Biochem Biophys Res Commun 206(1):302-9. (1995).
1994
Chow K,Ng D,Stokes R,Johnson P. Protein tyrosine phosphorylation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. FEMS Microbiol Lett 124(2):203-7. (1994).
2000
Ng DH,Felberg J,Johnson P. Determination of CD45 tyrosine phosphatase activity in T lymphocytes. Methods Mol Biol 134289-300. (2000).
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