Profile

Zhengming Wang is Professor of College of Horticultures & Forestry Sciences at Huazhong Agricultural University and Researcher of Hubei Hongshan Laboratory. His group studies roles of epigenetics in tomato growth and development, and roles of small RNA in tomato virus interaction. He has published research papers in Genes & Development, Nature Communications, Molecular Plant, PNAS, Plant Physiology and other journals. He has been selected for Hubei Talents program and Wuhan Talents program. Researchers with PhD in plant science, molecular biology, or bioinformatics are encouraged to apply for postdoc positions in the Wang lab (wangzhm@mail.hzau.edu.cn). 

Research and Education

2021 - now        Researcher, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, China

2021 - now       Professor, Huazhong Agricultural University, China

2013 - 2021     Postdoc, University of Cambridge, UK

2007 - 2008    Visiting Student, University of California, Riverside, USA

2006 - 2013     PhD, Tsinghua University, China

2002 - 2006     Bsc, Lanzhou University, China

Funding

2023-2026   Principle Investigator. Molecular mechanism of viral induction of tomato antiviral gene DCL2b. National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), general program.
2021-2026   Principle Investigator. Tomato epigenetics and 22nt sRNA. The Huazhong Agricultural University Start-up funding.
2019-2022   Co-Investigator. An RNA cascade and disease resistance in tomato. BBSRC, UK

Representative papers

Wang Z*, Wang XY, Martinho C, Baulcombe DC. Posttranscriptional Gene Silencing Using Virus-Induced Gene Silencing to Study Plant Gametogenesis in Tomato. Methods in Molecular Biology, 2484: 201-212

Martinho C, Wang Z, Ghigi A, Buddle S, Barbour F, Yarur A, Gouil Q, Müller S, Stam M, Liu C, Baulcombe DC*. CHROMOMETHYLTRANSFERASE3/KRYPTONITE maintains the sulfurea paramutation in Solanum lycopersicum. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 119: e2112240119

Zheng G, Hu S, Cheng S, Wang L, Kan L, Wang Z, Xu Q, Liu Z, Kang C*. Factor of DNA Methylation 1 affects woodland strawberry plant stature and organ size via DNA methylation. Plant Physiology, 191: 335-351

Wang Z, Baulcombe DC*. Transposon age and non-CG methylation. Nature Communications, 11: 1221

Yao S#, Wang Z#, Cao Q, Xie J, Wang X, Zhang R, Deng L, Ming J, Zeng K*. Molecular basis of postharvest granulation in orange fruit revealed by metabolite, transcriptome and methylome profiling. Postharvest Biology and Technology, 166:111205

Wang Z, Hardcastle TJ, Canto-Pastor A, Yip WH, Tang S, Baulcombe DC*. A novel DCL2-dependent miRNA pathway in tomato affects susceptibility to RNA viruses. Genes & Development, 32: 1155-1160

Xue W#, Wang Z#, Du M, Liu Y, Liu J-Y*. Genome-wide analysis of small RNAs reveals eight fiber elongation-related and 257 novel microRNAs in elongating cotton fiber cells. BMC Genomics. 14:629

Wang Z-M#, Xue W#, Dong C-J, Jin L-G, Bian S-M, Wang C, Wu X-Y, Liu J-Y*. A comparative miRNAome analysis reveals seven fiber initiation-related and 36 novel miRNAs in developing cotton ovules. Molecular Plant, 5: 889-900

Zheng B, Wang Z, Li S, Yu B, Liu J-Y, Chen X*. Intergenic transcription by RNA Polymerase II coordinates Pol IV and Pol V in siRNA-directed transcriptional gene silencing in Arabidopsis. Genes & Development, 23:2850-2860