About Elisa
Dr. Elisa Zhang is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Freeman Hrabowski Scholar and an Assistant Professor at the University of California, Davis in the departments of Physiology & Membrane Biology and Obstetrics & Gynecology. She was previously a Postdoctoral Research Scientist at the Stanford School of Medicine. Combining molecular, cellular, and in vivo approaches, Elisa is working to advance our understanding of adult stem cell biology, reproduction, and cancer, particularly in the context of women's health.
Elisa received an A.B. magna cum laude from Harvard College. After completing a Fulbright scholarship at EMBL Heidelberg in Dr. Andreas Ladurner's lab, she pursued her Ph.D. in molecular and cell biology in Dr. Robert Tjian's lab at UC Berkeley.
Elisa conducted her postdoctoral research at Stanford University, first in Dr. Julie Baker's lab as an A.P. Giannini Postdoctoral Fellow where she developed a novel mouse model of uterine injury and its impact on subsequent pregnancy outcomes. She then developed uterine endometrial organoids or "mini-organs in a dish" in Dr. Calvin Kuo's lab to model human endometrial dynamics and disease.
Education:
A.B. magna cum laude in Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard College
Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology, UC Berkeley
Postdoctoral scholar, Stanford University
Awards:
Elisa has earned significant recognition for her work over the years. Most recently, Elisa has been named a 2025 HHMI Freeman Hrabowski Scholar. While at Stanford, she was an A.P. Giannini Foundation postdoctoral fellow from 2017-2020. She has been highly successful at securing funding for her research through the NIH, the Stanford Maternal Child Health and Research Institute, the Stanford Women's Health and Sex Differences Center, and other organizations. Her doctoral work was awarded the Alan J. Bearden Award for the Outstanding Thesis on a Biophysical Topic and was supported by a UC Berkeley Distinguished Fellowship and an NSF Graduate Fellowship. Her teaching has earned high student ratings and was recognized with a UC Berkeley Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award.
Other:
Outside the lab, Elisa is a parent to two young children. In her spare time, Elisa enjoys cooking, playing music with her string quartet, hiking, and traveling.