Guochao Wei  Principal Investigator (PI) / Assistant Professor

Research Focus

Mechanisms of HIV-Host Interactions and Antiviral Drug Development

Contact Information

Email: weiguochao@hsc.pku.edu.cn

Education & Work Experience

Jun 2023 - Present: Assistant Professor / Principal Investigator, Peking University

Apr 2018 - Feb 2023: Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, USA

Dec 2013 - Jan 2018: Ph.D. in Virology, Heidelberg University, Germany

Jul 2012 - Dec 2013: Teaching Assistant, School of Medical Laboratory Science and Technology, Harbin Medical University

Sep 2005 - Jul 2012: Bachelor's + Master's (7-year program), Basic Medicine, Harbin Medical University

Personal profile

The primary research direction centers on investigating HIV-host interaction mechanisms and developing antiviral drugs, with groundbreaking achievements in HIV capsid regulation and capsid-targeted inhibitor development. Key research accomplishments include: (1) Pioneering the discovery of critical host factors regulating HIV capsid stability, elucidating the molecular mechanism underlying HIV-1 capsid integrity maintenance in the cytoplasm, and proposing the innovative theory of "spatially specific capsid delivery in cells." (2) Revealing novel interaction patterns between host factors and the HIV capsid, addressing a long-standing challenge in the field regarding high-affinity host factor-HIV-1 capsid binding mechanisms, thereby providing new strategies for designing capsid-targeted anti-HIV drugs. （3） Systematically deciphering the mechanism of the leading anti-HIV drug Lenacapavir, validating the feasibility of capsid-directed drug design, and uncovering the phenomenon of "drug-induced capsid hyperstabilization," which opens new avenues for antiviral development.

These findings have provided critical theoretical and clinical guidance for HIV treatment. The research output includes over 20 SCI publications, with first/corresponding authorship (including co-authored) papers in journals such as Science, Nature Microbiology, Nature Communications, and Gut Microbes, one drug development patent, and frequent invited presentations at major international conferences.

Principal Grants

National Natural Science Foundation Excellent Young Scientists Fund (Overseas)

National Key R&D Program of China (Ministry of Science and Technology)

General Program of the National Natural Science Foundation of China

General Program of the Beijing Natural Science Foundation

Publications

1. Bester, S.M.*, Wei, G.*, Zhao, H.*, Adu-Ampratwum, D., Iqbal, N., Courouble, V.V., Francis, A.C., Annamalai, A.S., Singh, P.K., Shkriabai, N., Van Blerkom, P., Morrison, J., Poeschla, E.M., Engelman, A.N., Melikyan, G.B., Griffin, P.R., Fuchs, J.R., Asturias, F.J. ^#, Kvaratskhelia, M^#., (2020). Structural and mechanistic bases for a potent HIV-1 capsid inhibitor.  Science  370, 360-364.

2. Rebensburg, S.V.*, Wei, G.*, Larue, R.C., Lindenberger, J., Francis, A.C., Annamalai, A.S., Morrison, J., Shkriabai, N., Huang, S.W., KewalRamani, V., Poeschla, E.M., Melikyan, G.B., Kvaratskhelia, M^#., (2021). Sec24C is an HIV-1 host dependency factor crucial for virus replication.  Nature Microbiology  6, 435-444

3. Wei, G., Iqbal, N., Courouble, V.V., Francis, A.C., Annamalai, A.S., Bester, S.M., Singh, P.K Huang, S.W., Shkriabai, N., Haney R., KewalRamani, V., Engelman, A.N, Melikyan, G.B., Griffin, P.R., Asturias, F.J, Kvaratskhelia, M. ^#, (2022). Prion-like low complexity regions enable avid virus-host interactions during HIV-1 infection.  Nature Communications , 13(1):5879.

4. Wei, G., Kehl, T., Bao, Q., Benner, A., Lei, J., Lochelt, M. ^#, (2018). The chromatin binding domain, including the QPQRYG motif, of feline foamy virus Gag is required for viral DNA integration and nuclear accumulation of Gag and the viral genome.  Virology  524, 56-68.

5. Bester, S.M., Adu-Ampratwum, D., Annamalai, A.S., Wei, G., Haney R., Fuchs, J.R., Kvaratskhelia, M. ^#, (2022). Structural basis of viral resistance to HIV-1 capsid inhibitor lenacapavir.  mBio , 13(5):e0180422

6. Lindemann, D., Hutter, S., Wei, G., Lochelt, M. ^#, (2021). The Unique, the Known, and the Unknown of Spumaretrovirus Assembly.  Viruses  13.

7. Ledesma-Feliciano, C., Hagen, S., Troyer, R., Zheng, X., Musselman, E., Slavkovic Lukic, D., Franke, A.M., Maeda, D., Zielonka, J., Munk, C., Wei, G., VandeWoude, S., Lochelt, M. ^#, (2018). Replacement of feline foamy virus bet by feline immunodeficiency virus vif yields replicative virus with novel vaccine candidate potential.  Retrovirology  15, 38.

8. Liu Y, Betts MJ, Lei J, Wei G, Bao Q, Kehl T, Russell RB, Lochelt M^#: Mutagenesis of N-terminal residues of feline foamy virus Gag reveals entirely distinct functions during capsid formation, particle assembly, Gag processing and budding. Retrovirology 2016, 13:57.

9. Lei J, Osen W, Gardyan A, Hotz-Wagenblatt A, Wei G, Gissmann L, Eichmuller S, Lochelt M^#: Replication-Competent Foamy Virus Vaccine Vectors as Novel Epitope Scaffolds for Immunotherapy. PLoS One 2015, 10:e0138458.

10. Wei G, Chen J, Liu A-Y, Zhang M, Liu X-J, Liu D, Xu J, Liu B-R, Ling H, Wu H-X^#: Prevalence of Helicobacter pylori vacA, cagA and iceA genotypes and correlation with clinical outcome. Experimental and therapeutic medicine 2012, 4:1039-1044.

Team