Keith Cheng

Dr. Keith Cheng is a Distinguished Professor at Pennsylvania State University, holding joint appointments in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and the Department of Molecular and Precision Medicine. He is affiliated with the Penn State Cancer Institute, Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, and the Institute for Computational and Data Sciences (ICDS). His research focuses on genetics, cancer biology, computational phenomics, and 3D imaging technologies. Dr. Cheng has led numerous NIH-funded projects and contributed to over 89 publications, with research outputs spanning from 1984 to 2025.

Research interests include phage/E. coli genetics, skin pigmentation, genomic instability, and the development of high-throughput imaging tools like microCT and synchrotron CT. He has pioneered web-based resources such as the zebrafish microanatomy atlas and contributed to initiatives like the Synchrotron MicroCT Imaging Resource for Biology (SMIRB). His work bridges basic science with translational applications, including cancer diagnostics and public health.

Dr. Cheng has received prestigious awards including AAAS Fellow and the Inaugural ICDS Faculty Scholar Award. He has supervised projects in genomic instability in zebrafish, calcium exchangers in pigmentation, and functional genomics core development. His lab actively collaborates on topics like mouse brain atlases and Daphnia magna histology, emphasizing automation and computational approaches in phenotyping.