Research

Skip to: Neurogenetics and neurogenomic imaging - Nanophotonic imaging

Neurogenetics and neurogenomic imaging

neuron

Mentors and collaborators: Peter Ren, Yosuke Tanigawa, David A. Bennett, Jian Ma, Manolis Kellis, Xiaowei Zhuang

I develop statistical genetics and 3D-genome imaging approaches to understand the human brain.

Highlighted work

  1. Li WF, Ren P, Liu S, Wang CY, Zheng P, Ren B, Lein ES, Zhuang X. 3D-genome organization and transcriptional activity in the human brain. Poster presented at: Harvard Medical School Soma Weiss Research Day; March 2026; Boston, MA.
  2. Tian X, Fabiha T, Li WF, Dey KK, Kellis M, Tanigawa Y. PRISM: ancestry-aware integration of tissue-specific genomic annotations enhances the transferability of polygenic scores. bioRxiv. Preprint posted online November 2025. (PDF)
  3. Li WF, Bennett DA, Kellis M, Tanigawa Y. Multi-cohort cross-trait polygenic endophenotype prediction in Alzheimer’s disease reveals distinct multi-level phenotypic and biomarker subtypes. Poster presented at: American Society of Human Genetics; October 2025; Boston, MA. (PDF)
  4. Li WF, Ren P, Liu S, Wang CY, Zheng P, Ren B, Lein ES, Zhuang X. Comparative analysis of 3D-genome organization in the human and mouse brain. Poster presented at: Harvard/MIT MD-PhD Program Retreat; September 2025; Cape Cod, MA.
  5. Liu Z, Zhang S, James BT, Galani K, Mangan RJ, Fass SB, Liang C, Wagle MM, Boix CA, Tanigawa Y, Yun S, Sung Y, Xiong X, Sun N, Hou L, Wohlwend M, Qiu M, Han X, Xiong L, Preka E, Huang L, Li WF, Ho LL, Grayson A, Mantero J, Kozlenkov A, Mathys H, Chen T, Dracheva S, Bennett DA, Tsai LH, Kellis M. Single-cell multiregion epigenomic rewiring in Alzheimer’s disease progression and cognitive resilience. Cell. 2025;188(18):4980-5002.
  6. Tanigawa Y, Sun N, Li WF, Boix CA, Galani K, Mathys H, Bennett DA, Tsai LH, Kellis M. Multi-polygenic score model informs the genetic basis of heterogeneity in Alzheimer’s disease. Talk presented at: Alzheimer’s Association International Conference; July 2023; Amsterdam, Netherlands. In: Alzheimer’s & Dementia. 2023;19(S12);e079231.
  7. Li WF, Tanigawa Y, Kellis M. Polygenic dissection of phenotypic heterogeneity in Alzheimer’s disease. Poster presented at: Broad Institute Scientific Retreat; December 2022; Boston, MA. (PDF)

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Nanophotonic imaging

end_to_end

Mentors and collaborators: Gaurav Arya, Charles Roques-Carmes, Zin Lin, Steven G. Johnson, Marin Soljačić

Through end-to-end optimization, I design nanoscale structures to enhance traditional imaging components, such as lenses in optical imaging and scintillators in X-ray imaging.

Highlighted work

  1. Arya G, Li WF, Roques-Carmes C, Soljačić M, Johnson SG, Lin Z. End-to-end Optimization of Metasurfaces for Imaging with Compressed Sensing. ACS Photonics. 2024;11(5):2077-2087. (PDF)
  2. Li WF, Arya G, Roques-Carmes C, Lin Z, Johnson SG, Soljačić M. Transcending shift-invariance in the paraxial regime via end-to-end inverse design of freeform nanophotonics. Optics Express. 2023;31(15):24260-24272. Editors’ Pick. (PDF)
  3. Li WF, Roques-Carmes C, Lin Z, Johnson SG, Soljačić M. X-ray Spectroscopy With End-to-End Optimized Nanophotonic Scintillators. Talk presented at: Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics; May 2023; San Jose, CA. In: Proceedings of the 2023 Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics. Fundamental Science; FW4C.4. (PDF)
  4. Li WF, Arya G, Roques-Carmes C, Lin Z, Johnson SG, Soljačić M. Transcending shift-invariance in the paraxial regime via end-to-end inverse design of freeform nanophotonics. Talk presented at: MIT PRISM Undergraduate Physics Conference; September 2, 2022; Cambridge, MA.
  5. Soljačić M, Roques-Carmes C, Rivera N, Lin Z, Li WF, inventors; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, assignee. Nanophotonic Scintillators for High-Energy Particles Detection, Imaging, and Spectroscopy. U.S. Patent Application US20250137942A1. August 2022.
  6. Li WF, Arya G, Roques-Carmes C, Lin Z, Johnson SG, Soljačić M. Angular and Spectral Sparse Sensing With End-to-End Optimized Nanophotonics. Talk presented at: Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics; May 2022; San Jose, CA. In: Proceedings of the 2022 Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics. Applications and Technology; JW5Q.2. (PDF)
  7. Lin Z, Arya G, Li WF, Roques-Carmes C, Pestourie R, Li Z, Capasso F, Soljačić M, Johnson SG. End-to-end Nanophotonics Inverse Design for Computational Imaging. Talk presented at: Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics; May 2022; San Jose, CA. In: Proceedings of the 2022 Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics. Applications and Technology; JW5Q.1. (PDF)

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