Shaun Zhang to Serve as Chair of the Department of Biology & Biochemistry
Shaun Zhang will officially become Chair of the Department of Biology & Biochemistry on July 1. He replaces the outgoing Chair, Amy Sater, who is stepping down after serving for nine years.
Zhang joined the University of Houston in 2009 as a tenured full Professor. He holds the title of M.D. Anderson Professor and has served as the Director of the Center for Nuclear Receptors & Cell Signaling since 2017.
His research focuses on the development of novel biotherapies for unmet needs in cancer treatment, especially for solid tumors. These efforts are focused on using specifically modified viruses to destroy malignant cells and leveraging this approach to potentiate the effectiveness of cancer immunotherapy. Some of the therapeutic agents developed in his lab are currently being translated into clinical applications for hard-to-treat malignant diseases. Another research activity in his lab aims at developing mRNA-based vaccines to prevent or treat herpes simplex virus infections.