Weiping Zhang
· ProfessorUniversity of Illinois Urbana-Champaign · Pathobiology
Active 1994–2026
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About
Professor Weiping Zhang leads the Zhang Laboratory at the College of Veterinary Medicine, Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine. His research focuses on advancing the development of effective vaccines against infectious diseases. The laboratory employs a multidisciplinary approach by constructing isogenic strains and examining virulence in animals, including germ-free models, to understand disease mechanisms, determine the significance of individual virulence factors, identify virulence determinants, and select vaccine antigen targets. This comprehensive study of pathogen virulence informs the design of targeted vaccines. The Zhang Lab integrates structural biology and computational biology tools, combining concepts from structural vaccinology and epitope vaccinology to innovate a novel epitope- and structure-based vaccinology platform called multiepitope-fusion-antigen (MEFA). This technology is applied to construct broadly immunogenic polyvalent immunogens and develop cross-protective cellular and acellular multivalent vaccines. The lab also develops and utilizes various animal models for pre-clinical efficacy studies of vaccine candidates, optimizing protocols and analytical assays to support vaccine development efforts. Through these efforts, Professor Zhang's laboratory contributes significantly to the understanding of infectious disease mechanisms and the creation of next-generation vaccines that offer broad and cross-protective immunity.
Research topics
- Biology
- Neuroscience
- Chemistry
- Pathology
- Genetics
- Biochemistry
- Medicine
Selected publications
Infection and Immunity · 2025-04-10 · 6 citations
articleOpen accessSenior authorABSTRACT No licensed vaccines are available for the largely antibiotic-resistant Shigella or enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC), the two most common bacteria causing children’s diarrhea and travelers’ diarrhea. Virulence heterogeneity is a key obstacle to developing vaccines against Shigella or ETEC. By applying a multiepitope fusion antigen (MEFA) vaccinology platform, we recently constructed epitope- and structure-based polyvalent proteins to induce cross-protective antibodies against het…
Infection and Immunity · 2025-03-12 · 5 citations
articleOpen accessSenior authorABSTRACT Post-weaning diarrhea (PWD) is associated predominantly with enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) and continuously causes significant economic losses to swine producers worldwide. Currently, there are no effective countermeasures against this significant swine disease. Challenges persist in developing vaccines against PWD since ETEC strains produce heterogeneous virulence factors, including F4 (K88) and F18 fimbria and heat-labile toxin (LT), heat-stable toxin type I (STa), heat-stab…
Recent progress in enterotoxigenic <i>Escherichia coli</i> vaccine research and development
Infection and Immunity · 2025-11-06 · 2 citations
reviewOpen access1st authorCorrespondingstrains that produce a heat-labile toxin and/or a heat-stable toxin (STa). ETEC is one of the top four leading causes of diarrhea in children in developing countries (children's diarrhea) and is the most common cause of diarrhea among international travelers (travelers' diarrhea). Remarkable progress has been achieved in understanding disease mechanisms and developing vaccines against ETEC-associated diarrhea. With an understanding of the disease mechanism and identification of virulence determi…
Applied and Environmental Microbiology · 2025-08-22 · 2 citations
articleOpen accessSenior authorABSTRACT There are no licensed vaccines against Shigella , a leading cause of children’s diarrhea and travelers’ diarrhea. To develop a cross-protective vaccine against heterogeneous Shigella species and serotypes, we attempted to apply an epitope- and structure-based vaccinology platform, multiepitope fusion antigen, to construct an optimal polyvalent chimeric immunogen with functional epitopes from the key Shigella virulence determinants. With Shigella invasion plasmid antigens B and D functio…
Microbiology and Immunology · 2025-08-16 · 1 citations
articleOpen accessSenior authorCorrespondingEnterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) is a leading cause of diarrhea in young children in low- and middle-income countries and the most common cause of diarrhea in international travelers. Currently, there are no vaccines licensed to prevent ETEC-associated diarrhea. MecVax, a protein-based, multivalent ETEC vaccine candidate, has been demonstrated to be broadly immunogenic and cross-protective in preclinical studies. However, the two recombinant proteins of MecVax were prepared from 2× Yeast…
Recent grants
NIH · $217k · 2011
NIH · $435k · 2016–2021
A subunit vaccine for enterotoxigenic E. coli associated traveler's diarrhea
NIH · $413k · 2014–2017
Frequent coauthors
- 130 shared
Hongcheng Song
Capital Medical University
- 103 shared
Ning Sun
Capital Medical University
- 92 shared
Jianmin Wang
Shanghai Children's Medical Center
- 68 shared
Jianmin Yang
Second Military Medical University
- 46 shared
Xiaoxia Hu
Qingdao University
- 45 shared
Yuanfang Liu
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
- 45 shared
Lei Gao
First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University
- 42 shared
Jian‐Qing Mi
Shanghai Institute of Hematology
Education
- 1996
PhD
Iowa State University
Awards & honors
- President, The Conference of Research Workers in Animal Dise…
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