Lab Members
Di Zhao, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
Dr. Di Zhao earned her Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Fudan University in Shanghai, China, with a major research focus on cancer metabolism. Dr. Zhao completed her postdoctoral training under Dr. Ronald DePinho, and her postdoctoral research focused on prostate cancer genetics and biology. In 2019, she started her independent laboratory at MD Anderson. Dr. Zhao has published in many high-profile journals as the first or corresponding author, including Nature, Cancer Cell, Cancer Discovery, and Science Translational Medicine. Her laboratory is currently funded by an NIH/NCI R01, a CPRIT Recruitment Award, and a Prostate Cancer Foundation Challenge Award, among others.
Yin Wang, Ph.D.
Senior Research Assistant
Dr. Yin Wang received her Ph.D. in Surgical Sciences from Kobe University in Kobe, Japan in 2002. She joined MD Anderson in 2013 and began her current position in the Zhao Lab in 2020. Dr. Wang has extensive research experience in mitochondrial biology, cell biology, molecular biology, and animal models. In the Zhao Lab, she manages transgenic animal colonies, performs surgeries and treatment on mice, and conducts benchwork. In addition, Dr. Wang is the lab manager and continually expands her expertise to contribute to prostate cancer research and therapy.
Chenling Meng, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Dr. Chenling Meng received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. During her Ph.D. studies, she focused on epigenetic regulation and signaling transduction in spermatogenesis and published two first-author research articles in Cell Death & Differentiation (2019 and 2020). Dr. Meng joined the Zhao Lab in 2019, and her studies focus on understanding the role of histone methyltransferase ASH1L in advanced prostate cancer.
Wei Shi, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Dr. Wei Shi earned his Ph.D. in Cell Biology from Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China in 2019. During his Ph.D. training, he focused on immunology and identified novel ligand-receptor pairs involved in immunoregulation in hepatitis (Shi et al., Journal of Immunology, 2019). Dr. Shi joined the Zhao Lab in 2020, and his studies focus on determining the role of immune checkpoint B7-H3 in prostate cancer progression.
Feiyu Chen, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Dr. Feiyu Chen received her Ph.D. from The University of Hong Kong. Her doctoral studies focused on epigenetic regulation during the initiation and metastasis of hepatocellular carcinoma and identified new potential medicine for cancer therapy (Chen et al., Clinical and Translational Medicine, 2020). Dr. Chen joined the Zhao Lab in 2021, and her studies focus on discovering novel roles of the epigenetic remodeler CHD1 in diverse prostate cancer subtypes.
Javier Leo
Graduate Student
Javier Leo is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Cancer Biology at the MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Houston, Texas. He obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Biochemistry from the University of New Mexico in 2020. He joined the Zhao Lab in Spring 2023, and his research primarily focuses on prostate cancer and B7-H3 targeted therapy, aiming to discover and explore biomarker-driven therapeutics for its treatment.
Anna DeBruine
Rotation Student
Former lab members:
Zhouyihan Li, Rotation Student
Haoyan Li, Postdoctoral Fellow (2019–2022)
Loraine Gigi, Summer Student
David Phillips, Summer Student
Justin Kim, Summer Student
Kaitlyn Tremble, Summer Student
Raymond Sun, Summer Student
Jingwen Hu, Summer Student