Dr. Kwok-On Lai received his Bachelor degree of Biochemistry with First Class Honours from the University of Hong Kong. He then pursued M.Phil and Ph.D studies at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) under the guidance of Prof. Nancy Ip. With the award of Croucher Foundation Fellowship, Dr. Lai performed postdoctoral research in the United States with Prof. Kelsey Martin at UCLA, where he used photoactivation and time-lapse imaging to study synapse-to-nucleus protein trafficking in neuron that underlies long-term synaptic plasticity.

Dr. Lai returned to Hong Kong and joined HKUST as Research Assistant Professor to investigate the role of protein phosphorylation in synaptic plasticity and memory formation. He then set up his own laboratory at the University of Hong Kong, where his team studies the interplay between intracellular transport, protein post-translational modification and synaptic function of neuron. His recent research includes the investigation of disease-associated genetic variations using human stem cell-derived neuron. Dr. Lai joined City University of Hong Kong in 2021.