Dr Yeh-Shiu Chu received interdisciplinary training as a cell biologist—integrating biophysics and cell biology—through Institut Curie/UMR144 in Paris. He subsequently conducted postdoctoral research at the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB) in Singapore, focusing on experimental validation of mechanosensing mechanisms that regulate cell–cell adhesion. After establishing his laboratory at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taipei, his research expanded to membrane dynamics and extracellular vesicle (EV) biology. Dr Chu remains an active bench scientist and is strongly committed to translating fundamental discoveries into biomedical applications; he has authored 30+ peer-reviewed publications (H-index=21) and is an inventor on three patents of novel recipe of hydrogel .

Cell–cell communication operates through intertwined biochemical exchange and force-dependent signaling that collectively regulate cell state and tissue function. In Dr Chu’s laboratory, two major research themes are pursued: (1) elucidating extracellular vesicle (EV)-mediated intercellular communication and advancing its application to clinically relevant assays, with particular interest in EV-based disease diagnosis for neurological disorders such as migraine; and (2) defining mechanotransductive operations at cell–cell contacts, focusing on how cell-adhesion molecules convert minuscule mechanical inputs into biochemical signaling and downstream cellular responses.

To address these questions, the lab maintains a multimodality live-cell microscopy platform integrating TIRF microscopy, spinning-disk confocal microscopy, and photo-perturbation strategies to resolve cellular and molecular dynamics and to test causal mechanisms in living systems. In parallel, microscopy-based and functional assays for EV analysis have been established to quantify EV–cell interactions, including EV tracking in live cells and response profiling. For mechanobiology in 2D culture, the lab has developed toolkits—such as soft-substrate stretching and ultrasound stimulation—to apply controlled, small-magnitude forces and to monitor fast and/or slow cellular responses by real-time fluorescence imaging. Finally, AI-assisted imaging analysis pipelines are implemented for robust segmentation and quantitative phenotyping, enabling scalable extraction of metrics from complex live-cell datasets.