Hong Zhou

Professor Hong Zhou is a distinguished academic at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), where he serves as a Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics. His work bridges structural biology, virology, and cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), with a focus on visualizing biological complexes and viral pathogenesis.

• Education: PhD in Biochemistry (Baylor College of Medicine, 1995), MS in Solid-State Physics (University of Science and Technology of China), BS in Physics (University of Science and Technology of China).

Research Interests: Professor Zhou pioneers high-resolution cryo-EM and cryo-electron tomography (cryo-ET) to study viral structures, microbial complexes, and cellular mechanisms. His lab deciphers how viruses like herpesviruses and coronaviruses assemble, enter cells, and interact with host factors, while also advancing computational methods for structural analysis.

Scientific Contributions: His recent work includes

• revealing novel α-synuclein strains linked to neurodegenerative diseases,
• uncovering species-specific features in herpesvirus tegument and envelope proteins,
• developing AI-driven cryo-EM techniques to resolve preferred-orientation artifacts.

Awards: He is an Elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology (2024), a Pew Scholar in Biomedical Sciences (1999), and has received the Basil O’Connor Scholar Award, Established Investigator Award of the American Heart Association, and the KH Kuo Award for Distinguished Scientist.

Labs & Collaborations: As founding Director of the Electron Imaging Center for NanoMachines (EICN) at UCLA’s California Nanosystems Institute (CNSI), he leads a multidisciplinary team advancing structural proteomics and viral pathogenesis research.