Student spotlight: Meet Runze Zhao

Education is one of the four pillars of UNMC’s mission, and our students are the lifeblood of that aspect of campus life.

In UNMC Today’s Student Spotlight, we get to know some of these students, who will become tomorrow’s health care professionals. Today we meet:

Name: Runze Zhao
Hometown: Zhengzhou, China
Program/year: Second-year graduate student in joint M.D./Ph.D. program and UNMC Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Neuroscience

List three songs on your playlist.

“Blank space,” Taylor Swift
“Team,” Lorde
“Skyfall,” Adele

What sparked your interest in your chose career path?
I have always been curious about this world, both in nature and humanity. Being a physician-scientist allows me to explore both areas to the largest extent. On the one hand, I can investigate the etiology and pathogenesis of diseases at the bench as a scientist. On the other hand, I can communicate with patients, listening to their experience and stories, at the bedside as a health care practitioner. That is why I was extremely excited when being informed that I was accepted by the M.D./Ph.D. program at UNMC. Now I enjoy my every day in this career path because I am always exposed to the latest discoveries in medical research while learning new ideas about health care culture in America, which is entirely different from that of China.

Your favorite study snack is:
Ferrero Rondnoir

Your favorite app is:
Zhihu daily

Three things people may not know about you:

My favorite food is bullfrog. I did not tell others here because amphibian is seldom on the table as food in America, and few people enjoy eating this bizarre animal.
I can play martial art. I learned Wing Chun in my last year of undergraduate. This kind of martial art is famous for being used by Bruce Lee and his master, Ip Man.
I was an expert in plant classification. I studied botany in high school and followed professors to collect plant samples in the wild. I could identify the family of a plant by dissecting its flower. Although I have forgotten most of this knowledge now, I am still familiar with the 20 most common families of plants.