HHS Secretary Names Five to NIAID Advisory Council
HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson today announced five appointments to the National Advisory Allergy and Infectious Diseases Council, the principal advisory body of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), one of the National Institutes of Health within the Department of Health and Human Services.
The council provides recommendations on the conduct and support of research, including training young scientists and disseminating health information derived from NIAID research. The council is composed of physicians, scientists and representatives of the public who contribute their time and expertise for a four-year term.
The new council members are: Stanley W. Chapman, M.D., professor of medicine and microbiology and Associate Vice Chancellor for Research Integrity at the University of Mississippi Medical Center, Jackson; Ruth M. Ruprecht, M.D., Ph.D., professor of medicine in the Department of Cancer Immunology and AIDS at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Mass.; Nathan M. Thielman, M.D., M.P.H., assistant professor of medicine at Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC; and Gail Williams Wertz, Ph.D., professor of microbiology at the University of Alabama School of Medicine, Birmingham. In addition, J. Brooks Jackson, M.D., M.B.A., professor and chairman of pathology at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, was reappointed to another four-year term
Dr. Chapman's research and clinical interests focus on the pathogenesis, diagnosis and treatment of fungal infections. As a member of the NIAID Mycoses Study Group and the NIAID Bacterial and Mycoses Study Group, he has participated in numerous antifungal treatment trials. He has served as board chair of the Infectious Diseases Society of America State and Regional Societies and is co-editor of Practical Approach to Infectious Diseases.
Dr. Jackson is director of the clinical HIV laboratory at Johns Hopkins Hospital and has been involved in clinical HIV therapeutic and prevention trials in the United States, Uganda and China. He is a funded investigator in the NIAID Adult and Pediatric AIDS Clinical Trials Groups and the HIV Prevention Trials Network. He is protocol chair of several adult and perinatal HIV prevention trials in the United States and Uganda, including the HIV Network for Prevention Trials (HIVNET 102) perinatal nevirapine clinical trial.
Dr. Ruprecht's primary research interest is HIV/AIDS. She has developed a research program focused on both understanding the basic molecular mechanisms involved in HIV replication and developing novel therapeutic concepts. She has collaborated with the National Center for AIDS Prevention and Control in China and with the Regional Primate Research Centers of the University of Washington and Emory University.
Dr. Thielman is a senior research fellow in the Health Inequalities Program at Duke University. His research interests include infectious diarrhea and HIV/AIDS clinical trials. He is an investigator in the NIAID Adult AIDS Clinical Trials Group and the recipient of a recent Fulbright Scholar Research Award for the conduct of HIV-related research and teaching activities in sub-Saharan Africa.
Dr. Wertz's research focuses on RNA viruses, including human respiratory syncytial virus, a major cause of illness in infants and children. She is past president of the American Society for Virology and has received two NIH MERIT awards as well as the Freedom to Discover Infectious Diseases Research Award from Bristol-Myers Squibb.
NIAID is a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIAID supports basic and applied research to prevent, diagnose and treat infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections, influenza, tuberculosis, malaria and illness from potential agents of bioterrorism. NIAID also supports research on transplantation and immune-related illnesses, including autoimmune disorders, asthma and allergies.
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