Dr Edwin Lim is a neuroscientist and biostatistician, graduated with a PhD in Physiology and Pharmacology (focus: neuroscience) at the University of New South Wales, and a Master of Biostatistics at University of Sydney in 2011 and 2018, respectively. He is an emerging leader in the field of targeted metabolomics (tryptophan) in neuroscience research: he held two Early Career Fellowships from Multiple Sclerosis Research Australia and Society for Mental Health Research; he leads the Translational Metabolomics Research Platform and the Analytical Lab in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Macquarie University; is an Executive Committee member of the International Society for Tryptophan Research (ISTRY), and Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Tryptophan Research.

Dr Lim has attracted ~$3.8M in research funding with over $1.5M as a chief investigator. He has over 59 peer-reviewed publications in prestigious journals such as New England Journal of Medicine, Progress in Neurobiology and Molecular Psychiatry.

Dr Lim’s research focuses on using biofluids (such as blood, urine, saliva, tears) as surrogate biomarker for neurological diseases. The aim of Dr Lim’s research is to unravel the complexity of environment-host interactions during disease progression and devise a platform for biomarker-guided precision medicine to help overcome medical conditions of a heterogeneous nature. He uses innovative approaches, combining biochemical analyses with mass spectrometry techniques and data analytics with machine learning to identify early predictors for disease prognosis.

Dr Lim supervise students in PhD, and Master of Research who are interested in metabolomics, neuroinflammation, complex data analytics and biomarker discoveries. Topics include metabolomics &: modifiable lifestyle risk factors, cognitive function, microbiomes, and genomic (tryptophan-related) interactions. 

Current research topics

Metabolomics of microbiota-host interaction in the gut-brain axis of neurological diseases;

Metabolomics of complex symptoms in the progression of neuroinflammatory conditions (neurodegenerative & psychiatric disorders);

Targeted Metabolome-Phenome interaction of Traditional Chinese medicine.