Zhang obtained MD from the
Wenzhou Medical College, Wenzhou, and PhD from the
University of Saskatchewan,
Canada. Zhang was Professor of Anatomy and Neurology (now Neuroscience) and a research group leader at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In January 2005, Zhang's group differentiated human blastocyst stem cells into neural stem cells, then further into the starts of
motor neurons, and eventually into spinal motor neuron cells (which play important role in delivering information from the
brain to the
spinal cord in the human body). The artificially generated motor neurons exhibited profiles the same as those normal natural ones, including functions like
electrophysiological activity which is the signature of
neurons. Zhang described this study, "... you need to teach the blastocyst stem cells to change step by step, where each step has different conditions and a strict window of time". This research would have high significance for those human diseases or injuries related to spinal cord or motor neurons. Zhang's next step focused on the communicational ability of these newly generated neurons when they are transplanted into a living
vertebrate. ==See also==