Qizhi Yao is a professor of Surgery and of Molecular Virology & Microbiology, Pathology & Immunology, and Pharmacology at Baylor College of Medicine and a health research scientist at the Center for Translational Research on inflammatory diseases at Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center in Houston, USA. She earned her medical degree from the Southeast University School of Medicine in China (1986) and a doctoral degree from Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta Georgia, USA (1996). After a brief postdoctoral training in Dr. Richard Compans’ lab, she became an assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Emory University School of Medicine in 1997. She was then recruited to Baylor College of Medicine as an associate professor in the Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery, Molecular Virology and Microbiology in 2002, and promoted to a full professor in 2007. She is a member of many professional societies including the American Society for Virology (ASV), the American Association of Immunologists (AAI), and the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), etc. She is also a member of the Center for AIDS Research (CFAR) and the Dan L Duncan Cancer Center (DLDCC).  She is one of the pioneer researchers in developing chimeric virus-like particles for HIV mucosal vaccine and pancreatic cancer immunotherapy.