Staff Profile: Wenwei Huang

Wenwei Huang, Ph.D.

Chemistry Lead

Division of Preclinical Innovation
Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases

National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences

National Institutes of Health

Email Wenwei Huang

Biography

Wenwei Huang is a chemistry lead the Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases program in the Therapeutic Development Branch within NCATS’ Division of Preclinical Innovation, where he has worked in various therapeutic areas, including oncology, neurological disorders, inflammation and infectious diseases. Through a collaboration with New York University, Huang developed a series of RORg inhibitors that was licensed to Orca Pharmaceuticals.

Before joining NIH in 2006, Huang worked at ArQule, where his research focused on high-throughput chemistry.

Huang received his doctorate from the University of Toronto and conducted his postdoctoral research at Emory University.

Research Topics

Huang is interested in medicinal chemistry and high-throughput chemistry. His current research focuses on developing drugs that block malaria transmission.

Selected Publications

  1. Phosphocyclocreatine is the dominant form of cyclocreatine in control and creatine transporter deficiency patient fibroblasts
  2. Discovery of 3-(4-sulfamoylnaphthyl)pyrazolo[1,5-a]pyrimidines as potent and selective ALK2 inhibitors
  3. Emetine inhibits Zika and Ebola virus infections through two molecular mechanisms: inhibiting viral replication and decreasing viral entry
  4. Efficient Synthesis of 1,9-Substituted Benzo[h][1,6]naphthyridin-2(1H)-ones and Evaluation of their Plasmodium falciparum Gametocytocidal Activities
  5. Novel lead structures with both Plasmodium falciparum gametocytocidal and asexual blood stage activity identified from high throughput compound screening