Zixu Mao, PhD

Following the completion of my medical and master degree training from Southeast University School of Medicine (Nanjing, Jiangsu, China) and Zhejiang Academy of Medical Sciences (Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China), respectively, I received my PhD from Duke University Medical Center (Durham, NC, USA) after the successful completion of my thesis study with Dr. Wolfgang Joklik in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology.  I then did my postdoctoral training in molecular and cellular neuroscience in Dr. Michael Greenberg’s laboratory at Harvard University Medical School/Children’s Hospital in Boston, MA. I joined the Department of Medicine at Brown University Medical School/Rhode Island Hospital in Providence, RI, in 1999, as an assistant professor and started my own independent research. I moved to the Departments of Pharmacology and Neurology at Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA, as an associate professor in 2005, and am now a full professor. My laboratory research focuses on the mechanisms of neuronal stress response and their roles in maintaining central nervous system homeostasis and in neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer’s disease. My work has revealed the signaling networks critical for these processes.