Ruizhe Wang · 王睿哲

Working at the bench and the terminal, on problems biology hasn’t finished asking.

I’m Ruizhe (Richard) Wang, a senior at UNC–Chapel Hill studying biology and computer science. I’m completing two honors theses: one at the bench in the Strahl Lab, on how the yeast protein Sas5 supports histone acetylation, and one at the terminal in the UNITES Lab, on predicting spatial gene expression from tissue images. I’m applying to PhD programs this cycle, drawn to chromatin, synthetic biology and machine learning for biology, and possibly, one day, to building something of my own.

This site is a file I intend to keep open: the work, what I’m thinking, what I’ve seen through a lens, and the people who know other versions of me.

For advisersResearch →Curriculum vitaeCV →Write to meruizhe@unc.edu
§ I

Work

Two labs, two methods: one asks a model, the other asks a protein.

Exhibit A

Strahl Lab

Experimental · Biology honors thesis · Current

A reader that may not be reading

My biology honors thesis asks how Sas5, the only "reader" subunit of the yeast SAS-I complex, supports the enzyme that places H4K16 acetylation. In purified-protein pulldowns, a conserved pocket residue that the related reader Taf14 needs to bind histone tails turned out to be dispensable for Sas5. Together with my mentor's cellular data, this suggests the Sas5 YEATS domain supports SAS-I mainly by holding the complex together rather than by reading histone marks.

Open case file→
  • Threads
  • H4K16 acetylation
  • Protein purification
  • Peptide-binding assays
  • Slides, posters & papers will be filed here.
Exhibit B

UNITES Lab

Computational · CS honors thesis · Current

Predicting spatial gene expression from tissue images

Can a routine H&E slide predict where genes are expressed in a patient the model has never seen? Training on two colorectal cancer patients and testing on the third, I compared squared-error and count-based training under matched settings. Count models track spatial patterns better but make larger overall errors. Whether the maps are biologically useful is still untested.

Open case file→
  • Threads
  • Cross-patient generalization
  • Count models for sparse data
  • Evaluation beyond correlation
  • Slides, posters & papers will be filed here.
§ II

Open directions

Where I want to go next. Interests, not accomplishments — listed so the right people can argue with me about them.

  1. 01Epigenetics & chromatinHow marks on histones decide what a genome does.
  2. 02Spatial transcriptomicsGene expression with its address still attached.
  3. 03Machine learning for biologyModels that earn the trust of experimentalists.
  4. 04Sequence models for DNA & RNAReading regulatory grammar straight from sequence.
  5. 05Synthetic biologyBiology as something that can be built.
  6. 06Protein engineeringDesigning function rather than only describing it.
  7. 07Biological materialsWhere living systems become substance.
  8. 08Drug deliveryGetting the right molecule to the right place.
§ III

Correspondence

ruizhe@unc.edu

Prospective advisers, collaborators, and anyone with a good argument — write. I answer.

Curriculum vitaeView →
Publications
None yet — filed when they exist
Theses
Biology honors thesis, Strahl Lab (Oct 2026)CS honors thesis, UNITES Lab (in progress)
Presentations
Poster, 27th Celebration of Undergraduate Research, UNC (Apr 2026)Honors thesis defense (Oct 30, 2026)
Public writing
“How Does Sas5 Recognize Histone Proteins?” SURF summary, Carolina Digital Repository (Aug 2026) ↗
Funding
Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF), UNC, 2026