Rate My Professor Shin-Ho Chung

Shin-Ho Chung was a professor in the Research School of Biology at the Australian National University (ANU), where he led the Computational Biophysics group. He earned a B.Sc. from Stanford University in 1962 and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1966, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at MIT and a faculty position at the University of London. Chung joined ANU in 1990, initially in the Department of Theoretical Physics, Research School of Physical Sciences, before affiliating with the Research School of Biology in the College of Medicine, Biology and Environment. His interdisciplinary career bridged physics, mathematics, and biology, beginning with seminal contributions to auditory physics, pattern recognition, bioacoustics, directional hearing, and inner ear function.

Chung pioneered ion channel research, publishing six articles in Nature and Science. Collaborating with electrophysiologist Peter Gage, he developed hidden Markov model-based signal processing techniques for analyzing single-channel currents from noisy patch-clamp recordings, as detailed in works like 'Characterization of single channel currents using digital signal processing techniques based on hidden Markov models' (Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 1990) and 'Double-blind Deconvolution: The Analysis of Post-synaptic Currents' (Journal of the Royal Statistical Society B, 1999). At ANU, he advanced computational biophysics using Brownian dynamics simulations to model ion permeation, selectivity, and gating in potassium, sodium, chloride, and viral channels. Key publications include 'Study of Ionic Currents across a Model Membrane Channel Using Brownian Dynamics' (Biophysical Journal, 1998), 'Permeation of Ions Across the Potassium Channel: Brownian Dynamics Studies' (Biophysical Journal, 1999), and 'Computational Methods of Studying the Binding of Toxins from Venomous Animals to Ion Channels' (Physiological Reviews, 2013). His group created the first molecular movies of ion flow through selectivity filters, elucidating selective transport mechanisms, and explored toxin binding for drug design and synthetic nanochannels like boron nitride nanotubes. Chung authored over 200 publications, several books with leading biophysicists, and held three US and Australian patents. He secured NHMRC Principal Research Fellowships and ARC grants for three decades, mentored numerous students and postdocs who advanced membrane biophysics in Australia, and championed Medical Advances Without Animals (MAWA) for computational alternatives to animal testing. His work remains influential, cited at the 2024 Ion Channel Gordon Conference. Chung passed away on 20 September 2024.