International Eurasian Academy of Sciences, IEAS

Academician

Zhijie LIU

Profile:

Elected Academician of the International Eurasian Academy of Sciences in 2020, Professor Zhijie Liu is a distinguished Chinese structural biologist whose research and professional work have focused on G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) structural biology, membrane protein crystallography, and structure-based drug design. He currently serves as Executive Director of the iHuman Institute, Dean of Dadao College, and Professor at the School of Life Science and Technology, ShanghaiTech University. He previously served as a Research Professor and Doctoral Supervisor under the “Hundred Talents Programme” at the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). A recipient of the State Council Special Allowance since 2012, he has been recognised as a Shanghai Leading Talent and has received the WuXi AppTec Life Chemistry Research Award (2012), the First Prize of the Shanghai Natural Science Award as first completer (2020), and the Ho Leung Ho Lee Prize for Science and Technology Progress (2022). He has also been named an Outstanding Doctoral Supervisor by the Chinese Academy of Sciences on three occasions. Professor Liu currently serves as Vice Chairman of the Chinese Biophysical Society, Executive Council Member of the Chinese Crystallographic Society, Council Member of the International Organization for Biological Crystallization (IOBCr) and the Asian Crystallographic Association, and Editorial Board Member of IUCrJ and the Journal of Molecular Biology.

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Professor Liu’s research has centred on the structural and functional investigation of disease-related membrane proteins, particularly GPCRs, and on the rational design of therapeutics based on three-dimensional protein structures. Through leadership of national major research programmes, including Chief Scientist roles in the National 973 Programme, the National 863 Programme, and key projects supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, his laboratory has investigated the atomic-level structures of multiple pharmaceutically important GPCRs, providing structural information relevant to the development of therapeutic agents for cancer and schizophrenia. As corresponding author, he has published more than 120 peer-reviewed papers in SCI-indexed journals, including Cell, Nature, Science, Immunity, Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, and PNAS, with four papers in Cell, four in Nature, and one in Science. He holds five patents related to therapeutic targets for cancer and schizophrenia. Through sustained structural research and international scientific collaboration, Professor Liu has contributed to connecting advances in structural biology and membrane protein science with structure-based drug discovery and translational biomedical research.