Dr Dingyi Yu is an analytical biochemist with 15 years of experience spanning core facility leadership, academic research, and industry technical support. He operates the mass spectrometry facility at St Vincent’s Institute of Medical Research, overseeing high-end LC–MS platforms including Thermo Orbitrap Fusion Lumos, Sciex QTOF and QTRAP systems, and delivering fee-for-service analysis and collaborative support for proteomics, intact protein analysis, metabolomics, lipidomics, and targeted small-molecule quantification.

His research focuses on protein chemistry and metabolism, post-translational modifications (PTMs), and kinase signalling pathways. He applies multi-omics workflows to investigate signalling-regulated metabolic networks, and combines proteomics with recombinant protein expression, mutagenesis and biochemical assays to study phosphorylation and protein–protein/small-molecule interactions.

Selected publications

Smiles WJ, Ovens AJ, Yu D, et al. AMPK phosphosite profiling by label-free MS reveals a multitude of mTORC1-regulated substrates. npj Metabolic Health and Disease, 3(1):8 (2025). doi: 10.1038/s44324-025-00052-7

Cramer DAT, Yin V, Caval T, Franc V, Yu D, et al. Proteoform-resolved profiling of plasminogen activation reveals novel abundant phosphorylation site and primary N-terminal cleavage site. Molecular & Cellular Proteomics, 23(1) (2024). doi: 10.1016/j.mcpro.2023.100696

Yu D, Natera SHA, Hill CB, et al. Discovery of novel neutral glycosphingolipids in cereal crops: rapid profiling using reversed-phased HPLC–ESI–QqTOF with parallel reaction monitoring. Scientific Reports, 13(1):22560 (2023). doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-49981-7

Ovens AJ, Gee YS, Ling XY Naomi, Yu D, et al. Structure-function analysis of the AMPK activator SC4 and identification of a potent pan AMPK activator. Biochemical Journal, 479(11):1181–1204 (2022). doi: 10.1042/BCJ20220067

Yu D, Boughton BA, Hill CB, et al. Insights into oxidized lipid modification in barley roots as an adaptation mechanism to salinity stress. Frontiers in Plant Science, 11:1 (2020). doi: 10.3389/fpls.2020.00001

Yu D, Rupasinghe TWT, Boughton BA, et al. A high-resolution HPLC-QqTOF platform using parallel reaction monitoring for in-depth lipid discovery and rapid profiling. Analytica Chimica Acta, 1026:87–100 (2018).  doi: 10.1016/j.aca.2018.03.062