Yuan Chang (; born 17 November 1959) is a

Taiwanese-American Taiwanese Americans () are Americans who carry full or partial ancestry from Taiwan. This includes American-born citizens who descend from migrants from Taiwan. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, 49% of Taiwanese Americans lived in the state of Califo ...

virologist and pathologist who co-discovered together with her husband,

Patrick S. Moore Patrick S. Moore (born October 21, 1956) is an Irish and American virologist and epidemiologist who co-discovered together with his wife, Yuan Chang, two different human viruses causing the AIDS-related cancer Kaposi's sarcoma and the skin cancer ...

, the

Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is the ninth known human herpesvirus; its formal name according to the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) is ''Human gammaherpesvirus 8'', or HHV-8 in short. Like other herpesvirus ...

(KSHV) and

Merkel cell polyomavirus Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCV or MCPyV) was first described in January 2008 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was the first example of a human viral pathogen discovered using unbiased metagenomic next-generation sequencing with a technique called d ...

, two of the seven known human

oncovirus An oncovirus or oncogenic virus is a virus that can cause cancer. This term originated from studies of acutely transforming retroviruses in the 1950–60s, when the term "oncornaviruses" was used to denote their RNA virus origin. With the lette ...

es.

Early life and education

Chang was born in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

and moved to the United States as a young child. She was raised in

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

and received an MD from the

University of Utah The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...

College of Medicine. Chang trained in neuropathology at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

under the noted clinical neuropathologist, Dikran Horoupian, publishing studies on eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome and

progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML) is a rare and often fatal viral disease characterized by progressive damage (''-pathy'') or inflammation of the white matter (''leuko-'') of the brain (''-encephalo-'') at multiple locations (''mu ...

. During this period she contributed to studies led by her friend,

Julie Parsonnet Julie Parsonnet is an infectious disease expert. She is a Fellow of the National Academy of Medicine and American Society for Clinical Investigation. Early life and education Parsonnet grew up in Millburn, New Jersey alongside father Victor Parso ...

, showing that Helicobacter pylori is a cause for gastric cancer.

Career

Chang moved to Columbia University to pursue her first academic appointment as a clinician-scientist. Although initially interested in using

representational difference analysis Representational difference analysis (RDA) is a technique used in biological research to find sequence differences in two genomic or cDNA samples. Genomes or cDNA sequences from two samples (i.e. cancer sample and a normal sample) are PCR amplifi ...

to study the genetic origins of brain tumors, she applied this technique to

Kaposi's sarcoma Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) is a type of cancer that can form masses in the skin, in lymph nodes, in the mouth, or in other organs. The skin lesions are usually painless, purple and may be flat or raised. Lesions can occur singly, multiply in a limite ...

resulting in the discovery of this new human tumor virus. In 1994, she co-discovered KSHV, also called human herpesvirus-8 (

HHV-8 Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is the ninth known human herpesvirus; its formal name according to the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) is ''Human gammaherpesvirus 8'', or HHV-8 in short. Like other herpesvirus ...

), working with her husband

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

. Chang, Moore and collaborators subsequently showed that this virus was the etiologic agent of

and

primary effusion lymphoma Primary effusion lymphoma (PEL) is classified as a diffuse large B cell lymphoma. It is a rare malignancy of plasmablastic cells that occurs in individuals that are infected with the Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (i.e. KSHV/HHV8). Plasmab ...

, while others showed it to be the cause of some forms of multicentric

Castleman's disease Castleman disease (CD) describes a group of rare lymphoproliferative disorders that involve enlarged lymph nodes, and a broad range of inflammatory symptoms and laboratory abnormalities. Whether Castleman disease should be considered an autoimmun ...

. From two small DNA fragments representing less than 1% of the viral genome, she cloned the entire KSHV 165 kbase genome and fully sequenced the virus genome within two years after its initial discovery. This led to blood tests to detect infection for this virus, discovery of viral proteins likely to cause cancer and elucidation of the role of immune evasion in carcinogenesis caused by virus infection. Dr. Chang is now the American Cancer Society Professor in the Department of Pathology at the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the universit ...

. She has received a number of awards for her work, including the Meyenburg Foundation Award for Cancer Research, the

Robert Koch Prize The Robert Koch Medal and Award are two prizes awarded annually by the German for excellence in the biomedical sciences. These awards grew out of early attempts by German physician Robert Koch to generate funding to support his research into the ...

, The Sloan-Kettering

Paul Marks Prize for Cancer Research The Paul Marks Prize for Cancer Research is awarded by the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center to recognize cancer researchers who are making significant contributions to the understanding of cancer or are improving the treatment of the disease t ...

, the New York City Mayor's Award for Excellence in Science & Technology, the General Motors

Charles S. Mott Prize The Charles S. Mott Prize was awarded annually by the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation as one of a trio of scientific prizes entirely devoted to cancer research, the other two being the Charles F. Kettering Prize and the Alfred P. Sloan, J ...

in Cancer Research, the Carnegie Science Award and an American Cancer Society Research Professorship.

Selected works

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chang, Yuan 1959 births American medical researchers American pathologists American people of Chinese descent American virologists Columbia University staff Living people Physicians from Utah Scientists from Taipei Taiwanese emigrants to the United States Taiwanese medical researchers Taiwanese pathologists Taiwanese virologists University of Pittsburgh faculty University of Utah School of Medicine alumni