Biography
Kang received a B.S degree in Mathematics (1981) and a M.S. degree in Applied Mathematics (1984) from Beijing University of Post & Telecommunications, Beijing, China. He earned his second M.S. degree (2003) and his PhD Degree (2006) in Statistics from the University of New Mexico.
Personal Statement
After receiving his M.S. Degree in Mathematical Science, Dr. Kang Became a faculty member of Beijing Forestry University (BJFU), teaching advanced mathematics. We worked there from 1985 through 2000, except for one year when he went to Kawasaki Steel Systems R&D Corporation in Japan for practical training in computer programming techniques. During his tenure at BJFU, Dr. Kang taught and developed many courses, including calculus, linear algebra, probability theory, mathematical statistics, method of mathematical physics, numerical analysis, mathematical modeling, and multivariate analysis, etc. Apart from teaching, Dr. Kang was involved in many research projects in forestry and environmental science, including forest growing and management, forest cultivation, global climate change. Being focused and diligent, he achieved great success in teaching and research, which brought him honors and awards, including the Outstanding Teacher Award of Beijing and Outstanding Teacher Award of Baosteel Education Fund, awarded to only a few people in the University each year. He was elected as an Expert of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification.
Dr. Kang came to the United States in 2001. Since then, he has continued to dedicate himself to applying mathematics and statistics in biomedical fields. Fascinated by the development of the Human Genome Project and its potential impact on biology and medicine, Dr. Kang decided to pursue his Ph.D. degree in biostatistics, focusing on genomic studies, because he felt this was the best way to affect human health. After earning his Ph.D. degree, he became a faculty member in the Department of Internal medicine at the University of New Mexico (UNM) and a member of the Biostatistics Shared Resource at the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center. His current research interests include statistical modeling and computational data analysis for cancer-related genomic studies, statistical evaluation of biomedical tests (biomarkers), and statistical applications in cancer epidemiology. As a critical statistician co-investigator, Dr. Kang has taken part in many NIH/NCI funded cancer-related genomic projects.
Dr. Kang also dedicates himself to education, and his teaching interests lie in biostatistics and genomic data analysis. He has offered many courses in these areas and has served as the supervisor of some Ph.D. students in Biostatistics.
Areas of Specialty
Biostatistics
Statistical Genomics
Computational Statistics
Clinical Prediction
Statistical Epidemiology
Achievements & Awards
1997 Outstanding Teacher Award of Baosteel Education Fund
1995 Outstanding Teacher Award of Beijing
1992 Young Backbone Teacher of Beijing Higher Learning Institutions
Gender
Male
Languages
- English
- Chinese
- Japanese
Courses Taught
Biostatistics in Clinical and Translational Research: It is a core course for the Programs of Certificate in Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS) and Master of Science in Clinical Research(MSCR). The course spans three semesters, providing an introduction to the basic concepts and methods of probability and statistics especially designed for clinical and translational research scientists
Introduction to Genomic Data Analysis: This 2-credit graduate course covers all three aspects for genomic data analysis: biological background, basic knowledge of bioinformatics for genomic data processing, and the statistical methods used to analyze genomic data.
Introduction to Bioinformatics: This 3-credit graduate course provides introductory lectures in the concepts of bioinformatics and basic methods used in bioinformatics
Research and Scholarship
Dr. Kang was among the first investigators in the U.S. to develop risk classification algorithms and predictive models from gene expression array data for clinical intervention in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). His work was documented in many publications in the high impact journals such as Nature Medicine, Journal of Clinical Oncology, Blood and Cancer Discovery. One of his first-author papers (DOI: 10.1182/blood-2009-05-218560) was featured in a review article that reported the significance of the work in Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology (https://www.nature.com/articles/nrclinonc.2010.58.)
Dr. Kang played an instrumental role in developing and validating a gene expression-based diagnostic test for a subtype of (ALL) termed Philadelphia-chromosome-like ALL. The diagnostic test has been approved by the FDA and has been used in matching the patients in the clinical trials conducted by the NCI Children’s Oncology Groups.