Principal Investigator

Hanrui Zhang, MB PhD

Herbert Irving Assistant Professor of Medical Sciences

Email: hz2418@cumc.columbia.edu

Dr. Hanrui Zhang is a macrophage biologist. She completed her PhD training in 2011 at the University of Missouri. Her graduate work centered on the crosstalk between immune cells and blood vessels in diabetes-associated vascular diseases. Her postdoctoral research at the University of Pennsylvania continued to address the mechanisms of cardiometabolic diseases focusing on macrophage lipid metabolism and inflammation using gene targeting in human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) with differentiation to macrophages. Her laboratory at Columbia University Irving Medical Center seeks to understand the dynamic role of macrophages in cardiometabolic diseases with the aim of finding novel mechanisms and new treatments.

Hanrui is the Immediate Past Chair of the Women’s Leadership Committee, the Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology (ATVB) council of the American Heart Association (AHA), and the Chair-Elect of the ATVB & PVD Council Investigator in Training Award Committee. She is serving as the Technical Review Editor for the ATVB Journal.

Education & Training

MB, 2003, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China
MS, 2006, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China
PhD, 2011, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO (AHA Predoctoral Fellow, NIH R90 Trainee)
Postdoctoral Fellow, 2016, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA (AHA Postdoctoral Fellow)
Associate Research Scientist, 2018, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, New York, NY (NHLBI K99/R00)

Read ATVB_net interviews to know more about Hanrui’s role as the ATVB Technical Editor and the ATVB Digital Strategies Team member.

Lab Members

Fang Li, PhD

Postdoctoral Scientist, AHA Postdoctoral Fellow, CDA Awardee

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9180-3615

Follow @FangLi

I am interested in the functional interrogation of coronary artery disease-associated loci identified by human genome-wide association studies. My current work focuses on the role of lysosomal acid lipase in atherosclerosis.

Education & Training

BS, 2012, Northwest A&F University, China
PhD, 2018, Univerity of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA

Xun Wu, PhD

Postdoctoral Scientist, AHA Postdoctoral Fellow

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0742-7459

Education & Training

BS, 2011, Anhui Science and Technology University, China
MS, 2014, Anhui University, China
PhD, 2019, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China

Mazal Zebak, BA

Research Specialist

Education & Training

BA in Chemistry, 2023, Harvard University

Tyler Shern

Undergraduate Research Assitant, SRF (Science Research Fellow) and SURF Scholar, Columbia University 2025

Philip Ha

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College 2026

Lab Alumni

Research Specialist

Jianting Shi, MS, Research Specialist (07/2018-08/2023) –> Data analyst

MS Student

Ziyi Wang, MS in Human Nutrition, Columbia University (09/2019-02/2021), Research Specialist (PT, 03/2021-07/2022) –> PharmD program
Shamma Ali, MS in Human Nutrition, Columbia University (09/2020-09/2021)
Rebecca Moore, MS in Human Nutrition, Columbia University (09/2020-09/2022), Research Specialist (Casual, 09/2022-12/2022)
Rehet Chugh, MS in Human Nutrition (09/2022-05/2024) –> MD program

Undergraduate Researchers

Eden Tilahun Teferi, Columbia College 2021 (09/2018-01/2019)
Raneem Hamad, Columbia College 2021 (09/2018-03/2020)
Eileen Moudou, Columbia College 2020 (01/2019-05/2019)
Yolanda Jean-Baptiste, BS, Fellow of the NERA Program (06/2019-07/2019)
Jeana Chun, BS, SURF Scholar, Columbia College 2022 (01/2019-05/2022) -> MD program
Annie Rozenblyum, BS, Barnard College 2022 (01/2019-05/2022) –> MD program

Columbia Data Science Institute (DSI) Scholars

Joey Zihui Gu, MS in Data Science, Columbia University (09/2018-12/2018) –> Data scientist
Jiayi Shen, MS in Biostatistics, Columbia Univ. Mailman School of Public Health (03/2019-07/2019) –> PhD program
Jianyou Liu, MS in Biostatistics, Columbia Univ. Mailman School of Public Health (03/2019-07/2019) –> Biostatistician –> PhD program
Joy Hsu, MS in Biostatistics, Columbia Univ. Mailman School of Public Health (11/2019-05/2020) –> Biostatistician
Neha Pusarla, MS in Data Science, Columbia Univ. (03/2021-06/2021) –> Software engineer
Sophie Shan, BS in Statistics, CUSP Scholar, Columbia College 2022 (11/2019-09/2021) –> PhD program

Visting Scientists

Yujiao Meng, Visiting PhD Student, Beijing Univ. of Chinese Medicine (12/2019-03/2021) –> Instructor

High School Students

Philip Ha, Townsend Harris 2022 (03/2020-08/2022) –> Undergraduate Research Assistant in the lab