BSc in Molecular Biochemistry and PhD in Chemistry at the Technion.
Postdoctoral fellowship at the Department of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School, working with Prof. Johan Paulsson. His focus was on noise in biological systems, and he investigated the distribution of plasmid copy numbers in E.coli as model systems for negative feedback loops.
Participated in the Technion Excellence Program: October 1998 – June 2000.
Joined the Program, essentially, to enable him undertake research during the early stages of his studies. His curriculum included, in addition to research, a number of advanced courses.
During his undergraduate studies, Shay worked with Prof. Uri Peskin and Prof. Yoav Eichen from the Faculty of Chemistry on the role of the molecular site in the control of proton transfer rates in crystals. The research combined theoretical calculation and experiments and the results were published.
Later he started to work with Prof. Yoav Eichen (Chemistry) and Prof. Gadi Schuster (Biology) on bio-inspired functional materials, which later on became his PhD. research. During this research, he synthesized and characterized new functional materials, such as electro-active (LEDs, transistors, memory units) and opto-active (sensors) organic materials. The design of these materials was based on biological principles, such as sequence-independent synthesis (peptides synthesis) and DNA-like self assembly.