YANG Zhen, Associate Professor and Master's Supervisor at Nanjing Agricultural University (NAU), dual-licensed veterinarian (China & USA). Member of the Organizing Committee of the Annual Veterinary Diagnostic Conference, Chair of the 10th NAU Swine Conference, Member of the Organizing Committee of the Leman China Swine Conference. Currently serves as Deputy Director of the Swine Veterinary Specialty Committee of the Chinese Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA), Deputy Secretary-General of the Swine Veterinary Branch of CVMA, and Coordinator of the Belt and Road International Innovation Institute for Diagnosis and Immunity of Major Transboundary Animal Diseases. Serves as the Lead Liaison for the FAO-NAU RENOFARM Training Program, and Director of the Zoetis-NAU Swine Health Research and Development Center.

He graduated in 2014 from the Veterinary Medicine program at South China Agricultural University with a Bachelor of Agriculture degree. From 2012 to 2013, he studied in the Infectious Disease Team of the Innovation Program at BGI Shenzhen. From 2014 to 2015, he studied at the Department of Animal Sciences and Pre-Veterinary Medicine, College of Agriculture, Kansas State University, USA. In 2015, he was admitted to the College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Minnesota, where he successively earned a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) degree, a Master of Science (MS) in Veterinary Medicine, and a Swine Medicine Certification from the University of Minnesota.

From 2019 to 2020, he was a visiting scholar at the Animal Health Service, Headquarters of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, participating in work related to the prevention and control of transboundary animal diseases such as African swine fever and COVID-19. Since returning to China in August 2020, he has focused on teaching in key areas including animal production medicine, transboundary animal disease prevention and control, and One Health, while actively engaging in domestic and international research and clinical service collaborations. He has led and participated in multiple curriculum development and teaching reform projects, won several university/college-level teaching awards, established and improved the farm animal veterinary talent training system, actively involved industry mentors, and created the NAU professional master's training model in swine veterinary medicine, supplying high-quality, application-oriented veterinary professionals to the industry. He has also been appointed by several large-scale livestock production companies, veterinary service companies, and animal health enterprises to provide health management services for the swine and dairy cattle industries, promoting the implementation and translation of research achievements at the production level. He leads a sub-project of the 14th Five-Year Plan National Key Research and Development Program, the Youth Fund of the Jiangsu Provincial Natural Science Foundation, and more than 10 university-industry collaborative research projects. He has published over 20 papers, two international monographs, and holds three patents and software copyrights.