Linqi Zhang

Linqi Zhang is a native of Beijing, raised and brought up by his beloved grandmother and mother, while his father was being re-educated in the labour camp during the Cultural Revolution in China.

After completing his Bachelor degree in Biology at Beijing Normal University, he ventured west to pursue his graduate studies on the evolution of HIV-1 with Dr Andrew Leigh Brown at the University of Edinburgh.

This research group produced several landmark publications during the early days of HIV research. Armed with a solid training from Edinburgh, he joined Dr David Ho’s research team at the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Centre in 1993.

Over the past several years, together with Drs David Ho, Marty Markowitze and Yunzhen Cao, he has made significant contributions to the understanding of virologic and immunologic responses during HIV-1 infection and treatment with antiretroviral therapy.

Linqi is now associate professor at Rockefeller University, and staff scientist at Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Centre, and was recently named as the Director of AIDS Research Centre at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS) and Peking Union Medical School (PUMC).

He believes that the key factor in the success of his career has been to retain “hunger and wonder with passion.”