Jianli Zhao, M.D., joined the UAB Department of Biomedical Engineering as an assistant professor on June 15, 2022.

Zhao comes to UAB from Thomas Jefferson University’s Department of Emergency Medicine in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he served as research assistant professor and research associate.

Zhao earned his medical degree from Shanxi Medical University in Jinzhong, China, in 2000 before completing an anesthesiology residency at the First Affiliated Hospital of Shanxi Medical University and later serving as an instructor and attending physician there in the Department of Anesthesiology. He served at the Shanxi Medical University as an Associate Professor for a decade before joining the Thomas Jefferson University’s Department of Medicine as a basic research fellow and later, a research associate. In 2018, he earned ECFMG board certification and went on to complete additional postdoctoral training as a research fellow in Thomas Jefferson University’s Cardiovascular Program in 2020.

Zhao’s research investigates the signaling mechanisms responsible for fluticasone anesthesia-mediated cardioprotection with the goal of identifying new therapeutic targets at the molecular, cellular, and organic levels within in vivo animal models for the purpose of ameliorating cardiac surgery-caused complications with or without the presence of type-2 diabetes. Zhao is also interested in the development of real-time monitoring strategies for the vital signs of large animals.