About Master Yang Yang, PhD

Master Yang Yang, PhD is the founder and CEO of WaQi, a virtual platform delivering evidence-based Tai Chi and Qigong for chronic pain, performance, and resilience — work featured at Harvard Medical School's 2026 conference, The Science of Tai Chi and Qigong as Whole Person Health. WaQi serves individuals, employers, and health systems.

The flagship Saturday Spine Class — a live weekly virtual program for chronic back pain — is rooted in Master Yang's own three-year, non-surgical recovery from severe back pain following a 2014 bicycle accident, and validated by his team's 350-participant randomized controlled trial — for which he served as lead author — published in the North American Spine Society Journal (2024), demonstrating clinically meaningful improvements in pain, function, sleep, and quality of life through virtual delivery.

A second flagship — Performance & Resilience — serves high-demand professionals, with biweekly live sessions launching through employer partners and an on-demand library covering sleep, stress, balance, immune function, and related wellbeing topics.

Master Yang is also the founder and Scientific Director of the Center for Taiji & Qigong Studies (CTQS), the New York–based 501(c)(3) nonprofit research organization whose randomized controlled trials in sleep, anxiety, balance, immune function, cognition, and general wellbeing — conducted since 1998 — provide WaQi's evidence base.

He earned his PhD in Kinesiology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. A lineage-trained Chen Tai Chi master and three-time intercollegiate martial arts champion in Shanghai, Master Yang began Tai Chi at age 12 to address a congenital heart condition, which had resolved within four years — an experience that shaped his lifelong inquiry into Tai Chi as a path to health. His training began in his hometown under local Grandmasters near the Chen Village region, the birthplace of Tai Chi, and continued from 1981 under three legendary 18th-generation Grandmasters — Feng Zhiqiang, Gu Liuxin, and Chen Zhaokui — until his relocation to the United States in 1993, with 40 years of teaching including 25+ years of clinical experience in the U.S. He is the author of Taijiquan: The Art of Nurturing, The Science of Power.

Yang Yang’s Early Life

A healing experience helped Dr. Yang Yang find his life's work. He was born with a congenital heart defect, and doctors warned his family that without surgery he might die. Such measures were beyond the resources of his family and, as a last hope, an uncle suggested that Yang, then 12 years old, try Tai Chi and Qigong to improve his health. It worked. His health and strength improved quickly and dramatically. He developed a deep appreciation for these arts and a desire to teach others. Master Yang studied for six years with three local teachers, (Wu Xiubao, Yuan Shiming, and Zhang Xitang) before going away to Shanghai to attend the university. During the next few years, he met and studied with Gu Liuxin, Chen Zhaokui and Feng Zhiqiang, all top grandmasters of 1970-80s era Chen taiji in China. He won first place in the Shanghai University Gongfu Tournament for three straight years (1981–1983) and was voted Best Overall Martial Artist in 1983. In 1987 he became a formal disciple of Grandmaster Feng Zhiqiang. 

Dr. Yang began refining his art before coming to the US in 1993. The response to Dr. Yang’s approach is broad and positive. His work has been well received among health professionals, and it has earned him a large following both among those seeking improved health and among martial artists. In 1996 he began public teaching to help individuals with specific health issues and to offer martial arts training. Wanting to bring the benefits and refinements of his system to a broader audience, he launched the online program from New York City in 2019.

To understand the power and mechanics of Taiji and Qigong beyond traditional explanatory frameworks, Master Yang completed a doctorate degree in kinesiology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign in 2005. His research focuses directly on the mechanisms and benefits of traditional Taiji/Qigong with publications of several scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals. Yang's detailed study of taiji/qigong enables him to clarify and/or demystify what are often obscure points of theory and practice, and to serve as a bridge between the Eastern/traditional and Western/academic fields. His traditional training also allowed him to distill the essence of various aspects of traditional Taiji training into an evidence-based program that he has refined over the course of several longitudinal studies. 

Other Credentials

Dr. Yang is the founder and Director of the Center for Taiji and Qigong Studies in New York City and was also a clinical specialist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in NY, where he taught patients and staff. In 2019 he launched his WaQi program combining unique elements of his training and experience to help others develop optimal mental, physical and spiritual health. Yang’s book Taijiquan: The Art of Nurturing, the Science of Power has been acclaimed as an instant classic by experts in Chinese martial and healing arts, and he is in high demand as a lecturer at academic and medical research institutions. Recent presentations included lectures at the Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, Harvard Medical School, Weill Cornell Medical Center, the Hospital for Special Surgery, American Public Health Association, American College of Sports Medicine, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).