Zijun Wang

Zijun Wang’s research focuses on how brain reward pathways are influenced by the environment especially stress and drug exposure and how maladaptation can lead to disease states. As a pharmacologist, her long-term research goal is to develop novel pharmacotherapies for brain disorders with abnormal reward processing specifically drug addiction and autism, by focusing on the epigenetics and circuits mechanisms. She uses multidisciplinary approaches incorporating behaviors, pharmacology, molecular biology, confocal-imaging, electro physiology, virus-mediated gene transfer, bioinformatics, circuit mapping, chemogenetics, transgenic mice tools and in vivo calcium imaging. She is using these techniques to explore the pathophysiological basis underlying drug addiction and autism, and to discover novel therapeutic targets for these brain disorders.

Professional Experience

• Research Assistant Professor (September 2019 - Spring 2020) - State University of New York at Buffalo (SUNY at Buffalo), Department of Physiology and Biophysics
• Instructor for Journal Club (Spring 2020) - SUNY at Buffalo
• Lecturer for Experimental Pharmacology (2009-2011) - Peking University
• Lecturer for Physiology (2008) - Jiangsu University