Yifan is a biophysicist and structural biologist. He was born and grew up in China, entered college in 1978 after the ending of the “culture revolution”. As an undergraduate, he studied solid state physics at Wuhan University. In 1991, he received his Ph.D. degree in physics from Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He continued his research in solid state physics and electron microscopy for five years as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Oslo and Max-Planck-Institute of Metal Research. In 1996, he changed his research direction to structural biology, and received further training in cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) from Professors Kenneth Taylor at Florida State University and Yoshinori Fujiyoshi at Kyoto University. In 1999, he joined the lab of Thomas Walz to setup a cryo-EM operation at Harvard Medical School. He joined the faculty of UCSF in 2006. Pioneering works of his lab in cryo-EM methodology and membrane protein structural biology facilitated the “resolution revolution” of single particle cryo-EM. He has been an HHMI Investigator since 2015. He is also the recipient of the Christian B. Anfinsen Award from The Protein Society (2018). He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Science in 2019 and the National Academy of Sciences in 2020.

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Adamo completed his undergraduate studies in Neuroscience at McGill University in 2016. It was there that he grew fascinated by the concept of cellular excitability, and resolved to study the molecular mechanisms by which cells fire in response to cues in their environment. Accordingly, Adamo earned his master’s degree in Neuroscience at McGill University in 2019, where his thesis work focused on characterizing voltage-gated sodium channel behaviour by electrophysiology. In his next steps, still motivated to answer questions of structure-function basis, Adamo wanted to build on his functional skillset and sought out training in structural biology.

Adamo is a joint PhD student in the labs of Dr. Yifan Cheng and Dr. David Julius. Adamo seeks to use single-particle cryo-EM to understand the structural mechanisms by which ion channels in the somatosensory system respond to a variety of stimuli in the outside world.

Supported by NSERC's Postgraduate Scholarship - Doctoral fellowship

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Maxine earned her bachelor’s degree in Health Sciences with a minor in Biology from Purdue University in 2019. During her junior year of undergrad, she was introduced to research and discovered her passion for macromolecular machines and structural biology under the mentorship of Nicholas Noinaj. Using X-ray crystallography she structurally characterized the β-barrel assembly machinery (BAM) component in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. To further pursue her interest in structural biology she joined the Biophysics graduate program at UCSF.  

In the Cheng lab, Maxine is focusing on developing methods to improve current obstacles in cryo-EM. Currently, she is working with the Agard lab on developing affinity grids to overcome the preferred orientation issue with membrane proteins. She is also working on developing single-particle tomography methods to improve current limitations in solving flexible biological complexes.

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Kevin earned his B.S. at the University of Texas, Austin in 2020. He then trained as a fellow at the National Institutes of Health, studying the mechanisms of mitochondrial iron uptake. In 2022, Kevin joined as a graduate student in the Chemistry and Chemical Biology program at UCSF.

As a PhD student, Kevin is co-advised by Yifan Cheng and David Julius. He is interested in studying the roles and function of ion channels in nociception and chronic pain.

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Amber earned her Bachelor of Science degree from the University of California, Santa Cruz in 2008. After graduation she went on to pursue her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. There her graduate mentor Janet L. Smith cultivated her passion for structural biology through the utilization of X-ray crystallography. She focused on the protein family of glutamine amidotransferases to understand how multi-domain protein complexes alter their structure to regulate the chemistry that occurs between distinct active sites.

Amber’s post-doctoral research focuses on the structural requirements that regulate protein-nucleic acid complexes in the context of viral replication and infection, specifically those comprised of host and viral components. Her current model system is that from HIV, comprised of the HIV viral protein Rev, which binds to the viral RNA transcript and recruits the host proteins Crm1 and Ran. This complex is critical for HIV replication and infection.

Supported by a National Institute of Health F32 Postdoctoral Fellowship 

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William is a membrane protein biochemist/biophysicist. He received his B.S. in chemistry:biochemistry in 2013 from the University of Loyola Chicago, where he also minored in music. At Loyola, he conducted research in the Herlinger Lab where he worked on synthesizing lanthanide-selective chelators for remediation of spent nuclear fuel. He then went to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to receive his PhD in biochemistry (2018). He conducted research in Aditi Das’s Lab where he studied multi-ligand kinetics of cytochromes P450, particularly CYP2J2. There, he developed an interest in lipid interactions with membrane proteins.

At UCSF, William is a joint postdoc in the Cheng and Julius Labs. He is interested in using cryo-EM to study how lipids regulate the function of ion channels.

Supported by the National Institute of Health's IRACDA program 

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Hao received his bachelor's degree in State Training Base of Life Science and Technology from Lanzhou University, after which he started his PhD in Prof. Ning Gao's lab at Tsinghua University. Hao has solved the structures of ISWI, RSC and ODA, central to both these projects was determining the function of large, ATPase-based complexes using single-particle cryo-EM.

Hao will collaborate with Geeta Narlikar's lab at UCSF to study chromatin remodelers, which utilize the energy of ATP hydrolysis to slide nucleosomes and play key roles in nucleic acid-related cellular processes. Hao will also try to use cryo-EM to determine the structures of some membrane proteins.

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Wooyoung earned his B.S. and M.S. from Tsinghua University in China. There, he studied programed cell death pathways by using X-ray crystallography, biochemistry and cell biology. He then pursued his Ph.D. at the Van Andel Research institute, Grand Rapids. He focused on the understanding channel gating mechanisms by using Cryo-EM and electrophysiology. He elucidated a channel gating mechanism of calcium homeostasis modulator 2 and resolved transient receptor potential canonical 3 during his Ph.D.

During postdoctoral training, he wants to understand/reveal mysterious protein behaviors and elucidate molecular mechanisms using Cryo-EM and other biochemical/biophysical tools.

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Jiahua earned both his B.S. and Ph.D. from Huazhong University of Science and Technology. In 2018, he joined Dr. Sheng-You Huang's lab, where he focused on the development of AI-based methods to interpret cryo-EM data, aiming to enhance the accuracy and efficiency of cryo-EM workflows. Jiahua's research contributions include projects such as EMBuild and EMReady, where he addressed the challenges of automating model building on EM maps, and improving the quality and interpretability of cryo-EM maps.

With a passion for unraveling the mysteries of molecular structures and interactions, Jiahua is poised to make further breakthroughs in the realm of cryo-EM and structural biology with AI-based techniques during his postdoctoral training.

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YongQiang (Y. John) joined the Cheng Lab with the main role of lab manager in 2016. Rather than just performing well-defined lab duties, Y. John aspires to do everything he can to ensure that the lab runs smoothly, which covers the procurement of lab supplies, organizing inventories, instrument ordering and maintenance, preparing lab protein tools, organizing lab activities, and so on. As a way of cherishing and benefiting from Cheng Lab culture, which aligns around Yifan's central chrism of "Always being encouraging and open!", Y. John's lab management also aims to develop and cultivate a lab environment with the least tension to make everyone work comfortably in the lab and focus exclusively on the science, with the thinnest barriers to make for free and full communications lab-wide.

Prior to working in the Cheng Lab, Y. John wound through his bachelor's education in pharmacy (Xinjiang Medical University) and PhD research in phytochemistry (Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences). He further anchored himself in the sciences over the course of his postdoctoral work in Professor M. Almira Correia's lab at UCSF, where he studied the roles of phosphorylation/ubiquitination on protein degradation using a family of cytochrome P450s as the model substrates to better understand the substrate selection/residues localization in ubiquitination. Altogether, his experiences have shaped his scientific interests in protein degradation and aggregation, post-translational modifications, non-canonical ubiquitination, etc. as well as any 'odd' observations encountered in daily work. 

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Shengjie earned her Ph.D. in Neuroscience, at the Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences, where she used mouse models to understand the mechanisms and functions of membrane proteins, including TRP channels and glutamate transporters, during neural development and disease.

As a postdoctoral fellow at UCSF, Shengjie works between Lily Jan’s lab and Yifan Cheng’s lab using single particle cryo-EM to study the mechanism of TMEM16 proteins.

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Li earned her master’s degree and PhD in Cell Biology and Development at NENU and BNU in China, where her studies focused on the genetic stability and evolution of plant allohexaploidization as well as the development of rice.  After graduation she went to Tsinghua University, where she engaged in structural and functional studies of the mechanosensive Piezo ion channels since 2016. In her next steps, she remained motivated to use cryo-EM to investigate macromolecular complexes in biological processes.

Li is an affiliated postdoc in the labs of Dr. Yifan Cheng and Dr. Stephen Nishimura. Li seeks to use cryo-EM to understand the structural mechanisms of therapeutic target in cancer and lung disease.

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Michelle has joined the Cheng lab as an administrative assistant for Yifan beginning April 2022. Her main role is assisting Yifan and John with administrative duties and assisting the lab with whatever help they may need. Michelle also assists four other department faculty.

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