Research Interests

Dr. Wenpin Hou is an Assistant Professor (tenure-track) in the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at the Duke University School of Medicine, and an affiliated member of the New York Genome Center (NYGC) since 2026. Since 2022, she has held a tenure-track Assistant Professor appointment in the Department of Biostatistics at Columbia University, where she is currently on research leave and remains affiliated with the Data Science Institute.

Dr. Hou’s group develops generative AI, foundation models, and statistically principled machine learning methods to understand how cells behave, change, and respond to perturbations. We work at the intersection of artificial intelligence, computational biology, and statistics, with current research spanning:

• Generative AI & foundation models for cells and genomic data
• Multimodal representation learning across RNA, epigenomics, and spatial data
• AI for perturbation modeling and prediction of cellular responses
• Large language models and AI agents for biomedical discovery
• Statistical learning of gene regulatory networks and cellular dynamics

Awards and Recognition

• 2025 Mentor of the Year from Columbia University Irving Medical Center in January 2026.
• Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA) for Early Stage Investigators (R35) from NIH/NIGMS in September 2023.
• NIH Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00) from NIH/NHGRI in March 2021.

Collaborations

Dr. Hou collaborates across diverse fields, including cancer, immunology, infectious diseases, and more. She is a member of the ENCODE4 consortium, contributing to advanced single-cell genomic analysis.

Education and Training

Dr. Hou received her Ph.D. in Mathematics from The University of Hong Kong in 2017, mentored by Prof. Wai-Ki Ching and supported by the University Postgraduate Fellowship and Postgraduate Scholarship. She completed postdoctoral training at Johns Hopkins University across Biostatistics and Computer Science in 2022, mentored by faculty including Prof. Stephanie Hicks, Hongkai Ji, Andrew Feinberg, Suchi Saria, and Aravinda Chakravarti. She earned her B.Sc. in Computational Mathematics from Sun Yat-sen University in 2013.

For Prospective Students

She is currently seeking PhD students eager to contribute to innovative research projects. Students from computer science, AI/ML, statistics, mathematics, engineering, and computational biology backgrounds can contribute to our research. Prior genomics experience is helpful but not required for many projects. If you are interested in a research position (e.g. research assistant, visiting student, practicum), please send her your CV.

News & Media

• Columbia News: A Mathematician Uses AI to Find Meaning in Genomic Data
• Columbia News: AI Comes of Age: Transforming Public Health Research
• Announcements: Wenpin Hou Awarded 2025 Mentor of the Year at Columbia University Irving Medical Center

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