Say hello to Dr. Jiayu Zhang! Jiayu successfully defended his doctoral thesis on "The Adaptive Mutations of Flaviviruses: Implications for Vaccine Development and Virus Evolution" at his final public oral on Thursday, November 6, 2025, with Alex as his doctoral mentor. His work focused on utilizing high-throughput sequencing and reverse genetics to investigate virus-host interactions and potential vaccine development, specifically focusing on RNA viruses, such as the yellow fever virus.

Jiayu has put in an enormous effort to earn his PhD in Molecular Biology, and this is an amazing milestone he has achieved. We are incredibly excited to see where his career takes him next and the achievements he will continue to accumulate. We wish him every success in his future endeavors!