Chao Zhong is a Principal Investigator and Deputy Director of the Materials and Physical Biology Division, at the School of Physical Science and Technology (SPST) in the newly established ShanghaiTech University in Shanghai, China. The Zhong laboratory aims to leverage Synthetic Biology tools for engineering living functional materials, dynamic bionanotechnologies. Chao received his B.E. in MSE from Tianjin University and his Ph.D. from Cornell University in the area of biomaterials. He conducted his postdoctoral research at the University of Washington, Seattle, where he developed the first solid-state bioprotonic field-effect transistor. He then worked as a research associate at the MIT Synthetic Biology Center, where he developed self-assembling multi-protein underwater adhesives using a modular genetic design strategy. He is the MIT outstanding Post-doctoral research award.