Kezhong Zhang, Ph.D., distinguished professor of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology and the Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics in the School of Medicine, has been elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He joins two other Wayne State University professors in receiving this prestigious recognition.
AAAS Fellows represent a distinguished group honored for their contributions across various disciplines, including research, teaching, and technology, as well as leadership in academia, industry, and government. They are also recognized for excellence in communicating and interpreting science to the public.
Dr. Zhang was selected for his significant contributions to the field of intracellular stress response, particularly for discovering the functions and mechanisms of cell stress sensors in regulating energy metabolism.
Dr. Zhang’s research focuses on integrated cellular stress signaling and inflammatory metabolic responses that drive the progression of complex diseases, especially metabolic syndrome, inflammatory diseases and cancer. In metabolic research, he discovered a liver cell stress sensor, called CREBH, that functions as a major metabolic regulator of lipid and glucose metabolism. In immunological research, he defined the physiological Unfolded Protein Response, or UPR, signaling and its roles in B lymphocyte development and macrophage inflammation.
Dr. Zhang’s research team is among the first to demonstrate that UPR inhibitors can efficiently suppress the progression of inflammatory arthritis. In research relevant to environmental medicine, he pioneered findings that the liver is a direct target of inhalation exposure to fine airborne particulate matter PM2.5 and that fatty liver condition is responsible for air pollution-caused Type-2 diabetes in non-obese individuals.
Dr. Zhang received his doctoral degree in molecular biology and genetics at Fudan University. He performed his postdoctoral training at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He is the inventor of eight U.S. or internationally-issued patents or licensed technologies. His research group discovered and developed a new technology to rapidly heal diabetic or acute burn wounds by modulating UPR in skin wounds. Collaborating with chemists at Wayne State, Dr. Zhang’s group plays a critical role in discovering and developing new compounds and technologies using modified “sugar” (glycopolymer) to treat diabetes and Alzheimer’s Disease. Additionally, Dr. Zhang and his collaborators repurposed U.S. Food and Drug Administration- approved anti-diabetes drugs, including Canagliflozin, Empagliflozin and Sotagliflozin (all SGLT inhibitors), for the treatment of cystic fibrosis-related liver diseases.
Dr. Zhang serves as editor-in-chief of Environmental Disease and on the editorial boards of eight other scientific journals. He serves on multiple National Institutes of Health study sections and on expert review panels for the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense Cancer Research Program, the Swiss National Science Foundation, the Senior Fellowship of University of Cambridge, the Austrian Science Fund, the Singapore National Research Foundation and the American Heart Association.
https://today.wayne.edu/medicine/news/2025/03/27/three-wayne-state-university-professors-elected-aaas-fellows-65850