Prof. Shelly Lap-Ah TSE
謝立亞教授

Prof. Shelly Lap-Ah TSE
BMed (Fudan), PhD (CUHK), PgDip. Occ. Hyg. (CUHK), FHKIOEH
Associate Director (Mainland Affairs) / Professor
shelly@cuhk.edu.hk

Research Links

ORCID:0000-0003-0355-6218

Academic Appointments

JCSPHPC

  • Associate Director (Mainland Affairs)
  • Professor in Occupational and Environmental Health & Epidemiology
  • Member of Executive Committee in JCSPHPC
  • Director, Center for Occupational and Environmental Health Studies (COEHS)
  • Director, The CUHK Center of Public Health and Primary Care (Shenzhen)
  • Director, Professional Diploma Programme in Occupational and Environmental Medicine
  • Director, Professional Diploma Programme in Occupational and Environmental Hygiene

香港中文大學

  • Associate Director & Courtesy Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Space and Earth Information Science (ISIES), CUHK
  • Chairperson of the Panel on Academic Matters, Institute of Space and Earth Information Science (ISEIS)
  • Chairman, Safety Advisory Committee – Environmental Hygiene and Surveillance, CUHK
  • Member of Management Committee of Institute of Environment & Fellow, Energy and Sustainability (IEES)
  • Member, Committee on Safety, CUHK
  • Member, Faculty Board of Medicine

Professional Service outside CUHK

  • 職業安全健康局 成員、研究委員會主席
  • 職業安全健康局 質素保證小組委員會主席
  • President (2019-2021) and Executive Council Member, Hong Kong Institute of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene (HKIOEH)
  • Member of Steering Committee of Occupational Health Education and Training, Hong Kong Workers’ Health Center
  • Member of Advisory Committee on Water Supplies, Secretary for Development, Hong Kong SAR Government
  • National Secretary of ICOH, P.R. of China, International Commission of Occupational Health (ICOH) – https://www.icohweb.org/site/national-secretaries6.asp (ICOH中國秘書)
  • 海峽兩岸醫藥衛生交流協會，精神衛生與精神病學專業委員會，常務委員

Bio

Shelly Tse is Professor and Associate Director (Mainland Affairs) of the Jockey Club School of Public Health and Primary Care, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She obtained her Bachelor of Medicine from Fudan University and PhD degree at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and received further training in the NCI/NIH of USA. Shelly’s research interests focus on assessing impacts of multiple occupational and environmental exposures on worker health, in particular heat stress, nightshift work, and silica dust. Shelly awarded research grants of HKD53 million and published 230+ research papers, and has ongoing research collaboration with important international partners, such as NCI/NIH, IARC/WHO, University of Exeter, Utrecht University and University of Toronto. Shelly is listed the World’s Top 2% Most-Cited Scientists in 2023, 2024, 2025. She received the Second-Class Award of State Scientific and Technological Progress Award (SSTPA) in 2014 (ranked #4) related to strategies in prevention and control for occupational dust hazard. Shelly now is holding several important positions to serve the professional societies, such as, National Secretary of ICOH, P. R. of China, Research Committee Chairman of Occupational Safety and Health Council (OSHC).

Award

  1. The Second Class Award of State Scientific and Technological Progress Award 2014, China (4th)
  2. National Excellence in Science and Technology of the Shenzhen Virtual University Park, 2013
  3. Global Scholarship Programme for Research Excellent, 2012 (in NCI/NIH)
  4. Best project awards for the Academic Year by OSHC/Hong Kong in 2003/2004 & 2006/2007
  5. Chinese young professionals in the mental health and neuroscience, the Committee of Funds of WHO, 07/1997

Honour

  1. The World’s Top 2% Most-Cited Scientists in 2023, 2024, 2025
    Honorary Advisor, Department of Family Medicine and General Out-Patient Clinics of the Kowloon Central Cluster, Hospital Authority, Hong Kong
  2. Adjunct Professor, Fudan University School of Public Health
  3. Visiting Professor, School of Public Health, Shanghai Jiaotong University
  4. Visiting Professor, Nanjing Medical University

Research Interest

Over 40 research related grants (competitive research, research contracts and consultancy projects) totaling over US$6.8 million (HK$53 million) as PI from sources including Research Grant Council, Health and Medical Research Fund, National Natural Science Foundation of China, U.S. National Institutes of Health. Recent research projects include assessing impacts of multiple environmental exposures (e.g., hot weather, greenness, noise, artificial light at night) and night shiftwork on worker’s health including sleep, circadian rhythm disruption, mental health, and other health outcomes such as breast cancer, health burden assessment of electronic waste recycling workers, influences of outdoor/indoor air pollution on health, and applying AI imaging-genetics to pneumoconiosis risk assessment.

Recent Funded Research Projects

Competitive research projects funded in recent 3 years as PI –

  • A repeated-measures study on assessing mental health impacts of hot weather among outreach healthcare providers in Hong Kong, sponsored by Research Grants Council (RGC) – General Research Fund (GRF) during the period 2026-01-01 to 2028-12-31, HKD 1,599,000 [PI]
  • Artificial Intelligence Assisted Diagnosis and Risk Prediction of Pneumoconiosis Based on Imaging Genetics, sponsored by Pneumoconiosis Compensation Fund Board during the period 2025-06-01 to 2027-05-31, HKD 2,486,280 [PI]
  • Assessing the mental health impacts of exposures to light at day and night, noise, and green/blue spaces among nurses with different work shifts, sponsored by Research Grants Council (RGC) – General Research Fund (GRF) during the period 2024-01-01 to 2026-12-31, HKD 1,215,948 [PI]
  • Identifying Risks of Outbreaks in Work Settings and the Implications for Control Measures, sponsored by Food and Health Bureau (FHB) – Health and Medical Research Fund Commissioned Research on the Novel Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) during the period 2021-08-01 to 2026-07-31, HKD 8,329,179 [PI]
  • Deploying Geospatial Big Data and Real-time Mobile Sensing to Assess the Health Impacts of Individual Exposure to Green/blue Spaces, Light at Night, Air Pollution, and Noise (GLAN), sponsored by Research Grants Council (RGC) – Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) during the period 2021-06-30 to 2025-06-29, HKD 5,876,674 [Co-PI]
  • Characterizing Roles of Paired Nightshift Work Schedule and Evening Chronotype on Alleviating Sleep Disturbance and Mental Health Problems among Nurses in Hong Kong, sponsored by Health Bureau (HB) – Health and Medical Research Fund (HMRF) during the period 2022-01-15 to 2024-07-14, HKD 1,204,040 [PI]

Non-competitive research projects as PI –

  • Refining a Proposal Regarding Assessing health impacts of internal and external multiple chemical exposures among e-waste and EVB recycling workers in the Greater Bay Area, sponsored by the Research Committee: Group Research Scheme 2025-26 during the period 2026-11-1 to 2028-10-31, HKD 300,000 [PI]

Selected Publications

Publications (out of 350 journal articles, book chapters, and edited/co-edited volumes)

Section A – Five Most Representative Publications in the Recent Five Years

  1. Weng X, Tang NHY, Ma JYT, Wan CCM, Liu Y, Wang F, Li B, Liao G, Li W, Ho AW, Ho CS, Arrandale VH, Tse LA*. Association of real-time noise exposure with rest-activity circadian rhythms and sleep health: a 7-day longitudinal measure among Hong Kong nurses with night-shifts. Environ Pollut. 2026 Oct 1;406:128644. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2026.128644.
  2. Li B, Wang F, Tang NHY, Huss A, Chan JW, Wing YK, Tse LA*. Chronotype differences in the risk of cancers, diabetes mellitus, and poor mental health among shift workers: a meta-analysis. Scand J Work Environ Health. 2026 Mar 1;52(2):98-109. doi: 10.5271/sjweh.4271.
  3. Li B, Li W, Lee PMY, Qiu S, Huss A, Ma JYT, Chan J, Ho AW, Ho CS, Kim JH, Chan EYY, Wing YK, Tse LA*. Associations between shift work arrangements, sleep characteristics, urinary cortisol and melatonin levels among nurses in Hong Kong. Occup Environ Med. 2025 Sep 16;82(7):335-342. doi: 10.1136/oemed-2025-110334.
  4. Liao G, Weng X, Wang F, Kuen Yu YH, Wong SY, Arrandale VH, Chan AH, Lu S, Tse LA*. Higher bisphenol analogues exposure levels in e-waste workers and their associations with DNA oxidative damage in Hong Kong. Environ Res. 2025 15;275:121415.
  5. Liao G, Weng X, Wang F, Yu YHK, Arrandale VH, Chan AH, Lu S, Tse LA*. Urinary metals and their associations with DNA oxidative damage among e-waste recycling workers in Hong Kong. Ecotoxicol Environ Saf, 2024;284: 116872.

Section B – Five Representative Publications Beyond the Recent Five Years

  1. Tse LA, Wang C, Rangarajan S, Liu Z, Teo K, Yusufali A, Avezum Á, Wielgosz A, Rosengren A, Kruger IM, Chifamba J, Calik KBT, Yeates K, Zatonska K, AlHabib KF, Yusoff K, Kaur M, Ismail N, Seron P, Lopez-Jaramillo P, Poirier P, Gupta R, Khatib R, Kelishadi R, Lear SA, Choudhury T, Mohan V, Li W, Yusuf S.Timing and length of nocturnal sleep and daytime napping and associations with obesity types in High-, Middle-, and Low-Income Countries. JAMA Netw Open, 2021;4(6):e2113775.
  2. Tse LA*, Lee PMY, Ho WM, Lam AT, Lee MK, Ng SSM, He Y, Leung KS, Hartle JC, Hu H, Kan H, Wang F, Ng CF. Bisphenol A and other environmental risk factors for prostate cancer in Hong Kong. Environ Int. 2017;107:1-7.
  3. Tse LA, Yu ITS, Rothman N, Ji BT, Qiu H, Wang XR, Hu W, Au JSK, Lan Q. Joint Effects of Environmental Exposures and Familial Susceptibility to Lung Cancer in Chinese Never Smoking Men and Women. J Thorac Oncol 2014;9:1066–72.
  4. Tse LA, Yu ITS, Qiu H, Au JSK, Wang XR. A Case-Control Study of Lung Cancer and Incense Smoke, Smoking and Residential Radon in Chinese Men. Environ Health Perspect 2011;119:1641-6.
  5. Tse LA, Yu ITS, Au, JSK, Yu KS, Kwok KP, Qiu H, Wong TZ. Environmental Tobacco Smoke and Lung Cancer among Chinese Nonsmoking Males: Might Adenocarcinoma be the Culprit? Am J Epidemiol 2009;169(5):533-41.

(*corresponding author)
Last Updated: 23 August 2026