Biography

Zhuzhen Zhang earned her B.S. from Department of Applied Chemistry of Chang’an University and Ph.D. degree from Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences. She performed her Ph.D. research in areas of iron metabolism in Fudi Wang’s lab, and started the early career planning in Jiarui Wu’s lab in SIBS. She completed postdoctoral training in skin and adipocytes research in Richard C. Wang and Philipp E. Scherer’s laboratories at UT Southwestern Medical Center from 2015-2021.  

Dr. Zhang joined the faculty of Wuhan university in 2022.

The Zhang laboratory’s research interests include dermal adipose tissue, the role of metabolism, particularly lipid metabolism in skin development and skin related diseases.

Research

Dermal adipose tissue

Sebaceous gland

Lipid metabolism in skin

Skin related diseases

Skin development and Aging

Representative  Publications

1. Zhang Z^#, Shao M^#, Hepler C, Zi Z, Zhao S, An YA, Zhu Y, Ghaben A, Wang M, Li N, Onodera T, Joffin N, Crewe C, Zhu Q, Vishvanath L, Kumar A, Xing C, Wang QA, Gautron L, Deng Y, Gordillo R, Kruglikov I, Kusminski CM, Gupta RK, Scherer PE. Dermal adipose tissue has high plasticity and undergoes reversible dedifferentiation in mice. Journal of Clinical Investigation. 2019. 129(12):5327-5342. (Co-first author)

2. Zhang Z, Zi Z, Lee E, Zhao J, Contreras D, South AP, Abel. ED, Chong BF, Vandergriff T, Hosler G, Scherer PE, Mettlen M, Rathmell J, DeBerardinis RJ, Wang RC. Differential glucose requirement in skin homeostasis and injury identifies a therapeutic target for psoriasis. Nature Medicine. 2018 May;24(5):617-627.

3. Zhang Z, Funcke JB, Zi Z, Zhao S, Straub L, Zhu Y, Zhu Q, Crewe, C, An Y, Chen S, Li Na, Wang M, Ghaben AL, Lee C, Gautron L, Engelking LJ, Raj P, Deng Y, Gordillo R, Kusminski C, Scherer PE.  Adipocyte iron levels impinge on a fat-gut crosstalk to regulate intestinal lipid absorption and mediate protection from obesity. Cell Metabolism 2021. 33(8):1624-1639.

4. Zhang Z, Zhang F, Guo X, An P, Tao Y, Wang F. Ferroportin1 in hepatocytes and   macrophages is required for the efficient mobilization of body iron stores. Hepatology. 2012 Sep; 56(3):961-71.

5. Zhang Z, Zhang Fan, An P, Guo X, Shen Y, Tao Y, Wu Q, Zhang Y, Yu Y, Ning B, Nie G, Knutson MD, Anderson GJ and Wang F. Ferroportin1 deficiency in mouse macrophages impairs iron homeostasis and inflammatory responses. Blood. 2011 Aug 18; 118(7):1912-22.