Zach received his M.D. and Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. For his doctoral work in the laboratory of Dr. Eric Nestler, he used RNA sequencing technology to identify networks of genes involved in stress resilience. Highlights of this work included in vivo use of CRISPR technology in mouse brain, where he showed that a specific molecular interaction could activate a network of genes and affect mouse behavior. Zach completed his Internal Medicine internship and residency at Duke where he is currently a research-track fellow in Gastroenterology. He is board certified in Internal Medicine and a member of the Duke Lefkowitz Society. For his research in the Bohoroquez laboratory, Zach is studying longevity and plasticity in the neuropod circuit with an eye towards understanding this pathway in disease states. His ambition is to become an independently funded physician-scientist who sees patients, performs endoscopic procedures, and conducts research in the filed of gut-brain interactions.