Nguyen (Nathan) Vo

Photo of Nguyen (Nathan) Vo

Assistant Professor Faculty of Human and Social Sciences Community Health Waterloo, Ontario nvo@wlu.ca

Bio/Research

Nguyen (Nathan) Vo has a PhD in Biology from the University of Waterloo (UW). He received the W.B. Pearson Medal for creative doctoral research. Following his doctorate, he conducted further scientific research at McMaster University, WLU, UW, and the University of Windsor.

Vo's resea...


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Bio/Research

Nguyen (Nathan) Vo has a PhD in Biology from the University of Waterloo (UW). He received the W.B. Pearson Medal for creative doctoral research. Following his doctorate, he conducted further scientific research at McMaster University, WLU, UW, and the University of Windsor.

Vo's research activities are interdisciplinary and diverse. He had formal academic training in cell biology and virology. His research portfolio has since expanded to include scholarship in immunology (antiviral immunity), radiation biology (radiation effects on human cancer cells and non-human biota), and forensic science.

He is the recipient of the 2025 Early Career Award from the Society for In Vitro Biology for recognition of his "significant and original of basic and/or applied research contributions in the area of in vitro biology".

In 2021, Vo conducted community-based research at UW where he studied COVID-19 antibody immunity in a campus population and in hospitalized patient cohorts. This project is part of the COVID-19 Immunity Task Force by the Government of Canada. One peer-reviewed primary research paper is published from this project: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772613425000022?via%3Dihub

Vo is an Associate Editor of the In Vitro Cellular and Developmental Biology - Animal journal. He is also a member of the Editorial Boards of Developmental and Comparative Immunology journal, Comparative Immunology Reports journal, and Frontiers in Immunology - section Comparative Immunology journal.

Prior to 2022, Vo taught undergraduate courses in the Faculty of Science and Faculty of Human and Social Sciences at WLU. He also taught a Medical Physics undergraduate/graduate course in the Department of Physics and Astronomy and a Life Sciences undergraduate course in the School of Interdisciplinary Science at McMaster University. In 2020, he received the Ontario Minister of Colleges and Universities' Award of Excellence for university teaching excellence.

Vo joined the Department of Health Studies at WLU as a full-time faculty member in 2022. He teaches Applied Health Sciences courses and Physical Forensics courses.

Research Interests / Ongoing Projects:

I study health at the cellular and molecular levels. A major part of my research approach relies on the development of in vitro methods and novel cell culture systems from lower vertebrate animal models for basic research and applications in cell biology, virology, immunology, radiation biology and environmental toxicology. A particular interest is to develop and characterize hematopoietic cell cultures that have the capacity to generate dendritic cells (a type of immune cells that perform antigen presentation and are essential in the activation of adaptive immune responses).


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Media Relations

Aonghus Kealy
Communications and Media Relations Officer
akealy@wlu.ca
(548) 889-4855

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Media Relations

Aonghus Kealy
Communications and Media Relations Officer
akealy@wlu.ca
(548) 889-4855

Lori Chalmers Morrison
Director: Integrated Communications
lchalmersmorrison@wlu.ca
(548) 889-4857

Vanessa Barrasa
Director: Communications & Issues Management
vbarrasa@wlu.ca
(548) 889-3812

Brantford Campus:

Beth Gurney
Director, Strategic Communications and Community Engagement
bgurney@wlu.ca
(548) 889-4199

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