I have the great fortunate of being mentored by many great mentors, I can remember all of them and how they spoke with me.

Some of them are in my official mentors, meaning our relationships are registered by paperwork, such as graduate school thesises, offer letters, and I am a part of the research family tree.

But many of them are my non-official mentors, meaning they just helped me as they have helped their own official trainees. Below are many of my personal notes and gratitudes to my mentors. These mentorship relationships have enriched my experience and inspired my thoughts on my future trainees.

• Prof. Ying-Shing Chan (my official Ph.D. advisor): I always remember him sitting on the computer with me, working on my slides one-by-one, and helping me prepare my talks. I always remember him encouraging me in one of my very first JC presentation, he kind of jumpped and said to all the labmates, “this is the best oral presentation I have ever seen, very clear and very logic” —- that was one of the best complement and encouragement I have received. 
• Prof. Yi Zhang (my official Postdoc mentor): many said Yi is a demanding PI, but the way I look at this is, he is the only true scientist I have seen who truly loves science. He just hopes we could love science as much as he does. I remember many things he had said to me, including once, he said, for my publication records and background, he will never give a chance to be interviewed, however, he was impressed by my motivations and strong interests in science, and that’s more important than anything else. 
• Prof. C Ronald Kahn (my official Postdoc mentor): Everyone treats Ron like “THE GOD” in diabetes/insulin research, but to me, he is like a father or grandpa (plus he has a similar age to my father’s). Ron has proudly trained more than 200 trainees (fellows and students) and he is also a faculty mentor to many junior mentors. Beyond science, I have exposed too many of my vulnerabilities to Ron, becauese I was struggling with everything in real life, family, my research area, my independence and my successes or failures. I trusted Ron and seeked his help, which he helps me, as much as he could, to be able to go through many difficulties. This is something very rare for a mentor to offer. For that (and many), I have my deep gratitude!
• Dr. Karoline Sulek (my non-official mentor): Karoline is the managing PI for my Denmark visit. She told me many words that I will benefit for the rest of my career. On one occasion, she told me that, she will never sacriface her trainees in order to reach to her career success. Every day during lunch time to have lunch with Karolina, it is the best time for us all.
• Dr. Cristina Legido-Quigley (my non-official mentor): Cristina is the reason that I wanted to apply for the Novo Nordisk grant. She is the best person in the world who can work on both AD and diabetes. She is also one of the greatest mentors I could say I really enjoy the meetings. She is extremely supportive, even I am not her official trainess, she gives me all the opportunities to grow my career trajactory, including co-applying a grant with me, and hosting my visit. She is the mentor that I want to collaborate for the rest of my career!
• Dr. Elizabeth Rhea (my non-official mentor). I have the great luck to have three exceptional female scientists to be my non-official mentors. They are not my mentors on paper work, but they are helping me at their best. Elizabeth has helped my career on too many things, grant writing, paper criticizing, co-chairing sessions, inviting me to her institute to give a seminar, introducing to many great PIs. What she helped on my career is what every mentor will help their traineees.