Biography

Dr. Zhang is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Sydney (PhD March 2022) specializing in Mycobacterial Genomics, with expertise in investigating drug resistance and local transmission patterns in tuberculosis (TB) in NSW, Australia by utilizing routine WGS data obtained from relevant real-life isolate. She is the project manager of the NHMRC 2024 e-ASIA Joint Research Program (2025 - 2027), which is a multidisciplinary collaborative program across Australia, Singapore and the Phillipines to explore genomic approaches to resistance to novel TB drugs. She leads the development of tNGS using long-read sequencing (Oxford Nanopore) for detecting drug resistance of TB.

Expertise

TB Diagnostics
Public Health

Key Impacts

Use of genomic and spatiotemporal correlation for enhanced TB prevention and care in New South Wales, Australia

The findings demonstrate the added value of integrating genomic and spatiotemporal clustering data to inform better targeted interventions pursuing the aspirational goal of “zero local TB transmission”.

Source: Conference 2024