Biography

Dr. Zhang received his B.S. (1993) in Biochemistry and Microbiology from Zhejiang University and M.S. (1996) in Genetics from Fudan University, China.  He then moved to the United States and received his Ph.D. (2002) in Molecular Biology from the University of Iowa, followed by postdoctoral studies with Dr. Robert G. Roeder at the Rockefeller University.  Dr. Zhang joined University of Cincinnati College of Medicine as an assistant professor of Cancer Biology in 2007 and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2013. Dr. Zhang’s laboratory aims to understand the fundamental biology of tissue-specific roles of estrogen receptor coactivators in transcriptional and epigenetic gene expression regulation in breast cancer, and to develop highly innovative RNA-based nano-therapeutics to target these coactivators for the treatment of endocrine resistant human breast cancer. Dr. Zhang has published more than 20 papers in leading peer-reviewed journals such as Cancer Research, Journal of Biological Chemistry, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci., EMBO J. and Molecular Cell. 
Dr. Zhang is the recipient of the first Joanne and Michael Masin Young Investigator award from the Breast Cancer Alliance and a C. H. Li Memorial Scholar Award from the Hormone Research Foundation. He has received the Postdoctoral Fellowship Award, Komen Mentorship Award and Career Catalyst Award from the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Breast Cancer Foundation. Dr. Zhang has also received an IDEA award from the Department of Defense and been named an American Cancer Society Research Scholar. He is a member of American Association for Cancer Research, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and The Endocrine Society. He also serves as a reviewer for NIH, DOD, Komen for the Cure foundation and Hong Kong Research Grant Council.