Rate My Professor Weiping Zou

Weiping Zou, MD, PhD, is the Charles B. de Nancrede Professor of Pathology, Immunology, Biology, and Surgery at the University of Michigan Medical School. He holds appointments as Professor of Surgery and Professor of Pathology and serves as Director of the Center of Excellence for Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy and Co-Director of the Cancer Hematopoiesis and Immunology Program at the Rogel Cancer Center. Zou leads a multidisciplinary laboratory dedicated to investigating the human cancer microenvironment, with a focus on the genetic, epigenetic, and metabolic mechanisms that govern tumor immune responses and inform the development of combination therapies. His research encompasses breast cancer, colon cancer, melanoma, ovarian cancer, and non-small cell lung cancer, revealing key mechanisms that regulate antigen-presenting cells and T cell trafficking and function within the tumor microenvironment, thereby influencing tumor progression, metastasis, and responses to immunotherapy, chemotherapy, targeted therapy, and radiation.

The Zou laboratory has made seminal contributions to tumor immunology, including the first demonstration of the expression, regulation, and functional blockade of PD-L1 (B7-H1) in the human cancer microenvironment and tumor-draining lymph nodes, which provided foundational concepts for combinatorial cancer immunotherapies. Zou has published nearly 200 articles and book chapters, garnering over 45,000 citations, and delivered more than 300 invited lectures at institutions and conferences worldwide. Key publications include 'Regulatory T cells, tumour immunity and immunotherapy' (Nature Reviews Immunology, 2006) and 'Aryl Hydrocarbon Receptor Ligands Drive Pancreatic Cancer Initiation and Progression through Protumorigenic T-cell Polarization' (2026). His work has profoundly influenced the field of cancer immunotherapy by elucidating immunosuppressive networks in the tumor microenvironment. Among his honors, Zou was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2019 and directs training programs such as the Surgical Oncology Research Training Program, supported by multiple NIH grants.