UHCOP Welcomes Nano-Immunotherapy Researcher Wei Gao to Department of Pharmacological and Pharmaceutical Sciences 

September 17 — The University of Houston College of Pharmacy recently welcomed Wei Gao, Ph.D., as an assistant professor of pharmacology in the college’s Department of Pharmacological and Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Gao completed undergraduate and master’s degree programs at the China Pharmaceutical University in Nanjing, China; a master’s degree program at the University of Calabria, School of Pharmacy in Arcavacata, Italy; and a Ph.D. degree program at the Peking University Health Science Center School of Pharmaceutical Science in Beijing, China.

Gao joins UHCOP from the University of Michigan, where she most recently worked as an assistant research scientist since 2022 and a postdoctoral research fellow from 2017 to 2021.

Gao’s research focuses on developing nanomedicines and nanovaccines to modulate B cells and myeloid cells in cancer and other immune-related diseases. Specifically, her work involves developing a nanovaccine to enhance B cell antigen presentation to achieve durable anticancer efficacy; nanomedicines to overcome STING pathway resistance by eliminating regulatory B cells (Bregs) for long-term efficacy in pancreatic cancer; and albumin-based nano formulations of immunomodulators targeting the lymphatic system, particularly B cells and macrophages, to combat various immune diseases.

Gao is part of a multi-principal investigator project team supported by a five-year, $2.6 million grant from the National Cancer Institute, which includes a subaward of $774,840 for her research. In collaboration with Duxin Sun, Ph.D., Charles R. Walgreen Jr. Professor of Pharmacy and professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of Michigan, the team is working to develop a novel cancer vaccine, called VAM-B/CD4, that promotes B cell and CD4 T cell crosstalk to achieve long-term, durable anticancer efficacy.

Co-inventor on nine U.S. and one Chinese patents under review, she has published nearly 30 research papers in such peer-reviewed journals as Science Translational Medicine, ACS Nano, and Biomaterials.

Gao has served has a guest editor for Frontiers in Oncology, Frontiers in Pharmacology, Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology, and Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences. In 2022, she was recognized as Frontiers in Pharmacology's Outstanding Guest Associate Editor and received the "High Impact Paper Award" by Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica.