Zemin Zhang Senior Scientist: Bioinformatics Profile | Education/Background | Top Scientific Papers | Awards & Honors

"I came to Genentech in January 1998 to join a large research program that used genomics technologies to find novel secreted proteins with therapeutic potential. Subsequently I have participated in a series of target discovery initiatives in which bioinformatics has played a pivotal role in identifying kinases or cell surface proteins with desirable physicochemical and expression characteristics. It is gratifying to see that computational approaches are directly contributing to our early-stage drug pipeline. At the same time, my collaborations with experimental scientists have inspired new research directions in bioinformatics that are relevant and interesting. The ability to do both basic and applied research has been a major attraction to many scientists, including myself."

Current Projects "Genetic alterations in cancers are common, but only a small fraction of these changes are oncogenic. While emerging genomics technologies present an unprecedented volume of data for discovering genetic aberrations in cancer, it is increasingly important to discriminate functionally relevant mutations from the rest. My group is currently developing bioinformatics approaches for such purposes. For DNA copy number alterations in cancer, we are combining array CGH or SNP array data with gene expression profiles to reveal recurrent patterns of genetic changes and driver genes under positive selection. For somatic missense mutations, we incorporate various information about the nature of amino acid substitutions, such as sequence conservation and protein structure information, to differentiate driver from passenger mutations. The ability to enrich true signal in cancer is critical for understanding cancer pathways and for identification of novel therapeutic targets and biomarkers. Similar principles can be applied to microRNA-mRNA interactions. By examining the dynamics between microRNAs and their target mRNAs, we are characterizing the rules that govern the degree and specificity of microRNA repression in cancer. From these studies we hope to identify relevant microRNA-mediated gene regulations that are disturbed in cancer cells."

Collaborations "The most exciting future discovery is not yet known, but will likely come from interdisciplinary collaborations. My group works closely with leading investigators who tackle a variety of pathways related to cancer, such as apoptosis, signal transduction, angiogenesis, and protein ubiquitination. The prospects of this collaboration network are very exciting. My group also collaborates with other members within the Bioinformatics Department. We are fortunate to be surrounded by talented computer engineers and programmers who have built state-of-the-art computing environments, database systems, and microarray infrastructure so we can focus on the scientific aspects of bioinformatics and oncogenomics."

Inspiration/Vision "It is a privilege to be part of Genentech Research, and it feels very special to witness the transformation of good science into breakthrough medicines. I hope that one of the targets we identify computationally will eventually lead to a real drug on the market, and that some of our bioinformatics methods can help understand cancer biology."