Dr. Jianyi 'Jay' Zhang is a scientist with a career-long interest in myocardial bioenergetics of normal and failing hearts at basal – and high cardiac workstates. In 2015, He have moved my laboratory from University of Minnesota after 28 years service there, to the Department of Biomedical Engineering (BME), at School of Medicine, and School of Engineering at University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), as the founding chair of the new joint department of BME.

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     Dr. Zhang have extensive experience and knowledge in cardiovascular physiology, tissue engineering, pluripotent stem cell biology, myocardial metabolism in normal or ischemic conditions, hypertrophy and heart failure using large animal models. He has served as the participant and leader of the AHA DeHaan Myogenesis Centers Initiative (2009-2013), the NHLBI supported Progenitor Cell Biology Consortium (PCBC, 2009-16), Progenitor Cell Translational Consortium (PCTC, 2016-23). His lab has also been working extensively with engineering human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSC) and human embryonic stem cell (hESC) cell lines for manufacturing functional cardiac tissues and exploring their therapeutic potential in cardiovascular pathologies. These pre-vascularized cardiac patches that are physiologically similar to naïve cardiac tissue can be used for drug testing, deciphering mechanisms of congenital heart diseases, and potentially serve as therapeutic products for their ability to survive, electrically integrate, and exert long-term beneficial effects on failing heart. He also has extensive experience and knowledge in biomaterials, tissue engineering, and myocardial bioenergetics of in vivo normal or hypertrophied dysfunctional hearts using MR imaging, spectroscopy, and large animal models.

     Dr. Zhang says: "I am fortunate to have mentored many talented trainees who have gone on to independent careers and leaders at prestigious academic (e,g., the Mayo Clinic, Washington University, University of Minnesota, Tufts University, as well as UAB) and private-sector (e.g., Medtronic, Boston Scientific, Genentech, Merck) institutions, and my lab remains exceedingly productive."