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Principal Investigator

Dr. Di Zhao earned her Ph.D. from Fudan University and completed her postdoctoral training under the guidance of Dr. Ronald DePinho. In 2019, she started her independent laboratory at MD Anderson. Dr. Zhao¡¯s research focuses on the biology and genetics of prostate cancer. Dr. Zhao has published in many high-profile journals as the first or corresponding author, including Nature, Nature Cancer, Cancer Cell, Cancer Discovery, STM, Nature Communications and Cancer Res. Her laboratory is currently funded by NIH/NCI, CPRIT, PCF, DoD and other agencies.

Xin Liang, M.D.
Senior Research Assistant/Lab Manager

Dr. Xin Liang received her M.D. from Zhongshan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-Sen University, and her M.S. from Capital Medical University. She joined MD Anderson in 2016 and began her current position in the Zhao Lab in 2024. In the Zhao Lab, she manages transgenic animal colonies, performs surgeries and treatment on mice and conducts benchwork. Additionally, Dr. Liang serves as the lab manager and continually expands her expertise to contribute to prostate cancer research and therapy.

Chenling Meng, Ph.D.
Instructor

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 research focuses on understanding the role of histone methyltransferase ASH1L in advanced prostate cancer. Dr. Meng reported ASH1L as an epigenetic determinant in promoting bone metastasis and metabolic reprogramming of macrophages in the bone niche (Nature Communications, 2025).

Wei Shi, Ph.D.
Instructor

Dr. Wei Shi earned his Ph.D. from Zhejiang University, where he focused on immunology and identified novel ligand-receptor pairs involved in immunoregulation in hepatitis (Journal of Immunology, 2019). Dr. Shi joined the Zhao Lab in 2020, and his research focuses on the immune checkpoint B7-H3 in prostate cancer. Dr. Shi reported that B7-H3 is a therapeutic vulnerability in prostate cancer harboring PTEN and TP53 deficiencies, and immunotherapies co-targeting B7-H3 with PD-L1 and CTLA-4 have curable therapeutic potential in castration-resistant prostate cancer (Science Translational Medicine, 2023).

Feiyu Chen, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow

Dr. Feiyu Chen received her Ph.D. from the University of Hong Kong, where she investigated epigenetic regulation during hepatocellular carcinoma initiation and metastasis, identifying new potential medicines for cancer therapy (Clinical and Translational Medicine, 2020). Dr. Chen joined the Zhao Lab in 2021 and focuses on identifying metabolic vulnerabilities of an emerging molecular subtype of prostate cancer containing SPOP and CHD1 defects. Dr. Chen reported that CHD1 loss reprograms SREBP2-driven cholesterol synthesis to fuel androgen-responsive growth and castration resistance in prostate tumors with SPOP mutations (Nature Cancer, 2025). Dr. Chen received the 2025 AACR Scholar-in-Training Award.

Qianlin Gu, M.D., Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow

Dr. Qianlin Gu received his M.D. from Jinan University and his Ph.D. from Lanzhou University. His doctoral studies focused on enhancing the efficacy of anti-angiogenesis and immunotherapy combination therapy by targeting SHCBP1 (Molecular Carcinogenesis, 2024; Cancer Science, 2024). In 2024, Dr. Gu joined the Zhao Lab, where his research focuses on characterizing the genetic determinants and immune checkpoints that reshape the metastatic niche of prostate cancer.

Javier Leo
Graduate Student

Javier Leo is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in cancer biology at the MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences (GSBS). He obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in biochemistry from the University of New Mexico in 2020, and he joined the Zhao Lab in 2023. His research primarily focuses on the immune checkpoint B7-H3 and the targeting of B7-H3 using antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), with the aim of discovering and exploring biomarker-driven therapeutics for advanced prostate cancer. Javier received the 2023 GSBS Oates Family Fellowship.

Naayaa Mehta
Summer Student (2025)

Yaman Albittar
Summer Student (2025)