Officers and Executive Board 2011 - 2013 ISV Advisors

For ISV Members

Benefit
Application
Renew your membership

ISV Annual Global Congress

1st Congress
2nd Congress
3rd Congress
4th Congress
5th Congress

About ISV - Elections

Background Information about Candidates

Dr. Anne De Groot received her BA degree from Smith College (Northampton, MA) in 1978 followed by her MD degree from the Pritzker School of Medicine at the University of Chicago (Chicago, IL) in 1983. She trained in internal medicine at Tufts New England Medical Center (Boston, MA) for 3 years, before she completed her postdoctoral training in immunoinformatics and vaccine research at the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, MD). In 1989 she returned to Tufts NEMC for clinical training in geographic medicine and infectious diseases, obtaining specialty status in Infectious Disease in 1992.

In 1992 Dr. De Groot joined the faculty of the Brown University Medical School (Providence, RI) as Assistant Professor, starting out with opening the TB/HIV research laboratory. In 1998 she founded EpiVax and then licensed the EpiMatrix technology from Brown. She has been CEO and CSO of EpiVax ever since. She has been the recipient of more than $26M in NIH grants for her vaccine research at Brown University and EpiVax. In 2008, Dr. De Groot was appointed Professor and Director of the Institute for Immunology and Informatics (I’Cubed) at the University of Rhode Island, Providence, RI. In that capacity she is the PI of a large vaccine-related U grant, employing immuninformatics tools to accelerate the development of vaccines for HIV, TB, and emerging infectious diseases (HCV, H.pylori) as well as biowarfare agents (Burkholderia, tularemia).

During the course of her career Dr. De Groot has received numerous awards and honors, the most recent one being the ”Lifetime Achievement Award 2009“ (Providence Business News). She is regularly invited to chair and speak at national and international meetings in the field of vaccinology, and her research has been published in over 115 original, review or commentary articles in well renowned scientific journals. She is a founding member of the International Immunomics Society, and has, in collaboration with researchers at Brown University, organized three conferences on vaccine research in Providence (Vaccine Renaissance I, II, III). Besides several other editorial appointments, she was Editor-in-Chief of the journal Infectious Diseases in Corrections Report (IDCR) for ten years. Furthermore, Dr. De Groot takes the lead in social welfare projects such as being Scientific Director of the non-profit organization GAIA Vaccine Foundation and Medical Director of Clinica Esperanza (Hope Clinic).

Dr. Adolfo García-Sastre received his PhD in 1990 at the University of Salamanca in Spain. He currently is Professor in the Departments of Microbiology and of Medicine of Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in NY, where he also co-directs the Global Health and Emerging Pathogens Institute. His research focus on the molecular biology of RNA virus, viral innate immunity, influenza virus vaccines and the development of RNA virus vaccine vectors. He has been among the first members of the NIH Vaccine Study Section and since 2009, he serves as Secretary of the ISV.

Dr. Dennis Klinman received his MD/PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1982. He headed the Section of Viral Immunology at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research of the FDA before joining the Laboratory of Experimental Immunology of the National Cancer Institute as chief of the Immunoregulation Group. He has authored over 250 peer reviewed articles. Dr. Klinman’s research focuses on the ability of immunostimulatory CpG oligodeoxynucleotides (ODN) to alter the inflammatory and immune milieu of the host. CpG DNA interacts with toll-like receptor 9 to trigger an innate immune response that improves host resistance to a wide range of infectious microorganisms and tumors. CpG DNA also improves antigen presenting cell function, thereby facilitating the development of an adaptive immune response when co-administered with vaccines encoding pathogen or tumor specific antigens. His lab also has considerable interest in DNA vaccines, and vaccines against biothreat agents.

Dr. Shan Lu received his MD in 1982 from Nanjing Medical University, China and his PhD in 1991 from the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS), USA. He currently is a Professor in the Department of Medicine at UMMS. He has been the founding director of China-US Vaccine Research Center since 2006. His research interest is in DNA immunization and its applications in biodefense and emerging infectious disease vaccine development. He is a member of Vaccine editorial board and since 2008, he serves as the Treasurer of the ISV.

Dr. Peter Nara holds a M.Sc. in Immunopharmacology(1979), Doctor of Philosophy in Retrovirology (1986), and a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine from The Ohio State University(1984). He also completed a 4-year residency in comparative pathology at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington D.C. He was a tenured section chief at the National Cancer Institute and is currently Professor, Endowed Eugene Lloyd Chair in Vaccinology in the Department of Biomedical Sciences in the College of Veterinary Medicine and the Director of the Center for Advanced Host Defenses, Immunobiotics and Translational Comparative Medicine at Iowa State University. His research focus is advancing the discovery of Deceptive Imprinting and its role in understanding how pathogens escape host immunity and novel ways of circumventing this problem in vaccine design. He was the founding President of ISV and serves on the board of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.

Dr. John Oxford is Professor of Virology at St Bart's and The Royal London Hospital
and Scientific Director Retroscreen Virology Ltd. Dr. Oxford’s particular experience is in laboratory work with viruses but especially influenza and more recently 1918 influenza from pathology and exhumation samples. Recent work with vaccines has focussed on our London quarantine unit in which volunteers are prior immunised and then infected with influenza, RSV or common cold virus or norovirus. Additional studies include identification of T cell sub sets able to give some cross immunity to influenza and RSV and host cell genes activated during infection. Practical experience with coordinating a small medium enterprise (SME), Retroscreen Virology Ltd and working closely with large vaccine manufacturing groups.

Dr. Clarisa B. Palatnik de Sousa is currently Senior Professor of Microbiology and Chief of the Laboratory of Biology and Biochemistry of Leishmania the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. She is also level 1C Researcher of the Brazilian National Council of Scientific and Technological Development (CNPQ), Top Reviewer of Vaccine (Elsevier, 2007 and 2008) and member of the Standing Executive Board of the International Society for Vaccines, since January 2009. In acknowledgement of her work in vaccinology and public health in Brazil she received the motion of congratulation of the Rio de Janeiro City council chamber. Dr Palatnik de Sousa formal education include her Bachelor of Science (Biology) from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, her MSc and PhD (Microbiology) from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. She was also a Research Student of the Katzir-Katchalsky Laboratory of the Biophysics and Biological Membranes Department of The Weizman Institute of Science, Israel. Dr Palatnik de Sousa experience in vaccine research include the development of the first licensed second-generation vaccine against visceral leishmaniasis of the World called Leishmune®, which is also the first to be licensed for prophylaxis against canine visceral leishmaniasis. She leadered the identification of the antigen and adjuvant, the scaling-up of the industrial formulations, the Phase I-III trials and the tests required by the regulatory agencies describing the decrease of the human and canine incidence in endemic areas after Leishmune® vaccination and its immunotherapeutic and immunochemotherapeutic potential. Her expertise also includes the test and development of function-structure studies on QS21 and CP05 saponin adjuvants and the identification of the gene of the main component of the Leishmune® vaccine, the development of a DNA, a recombinant protein and a synthetic vaccine against leishmaniasis. Dr Palatnik de Sousa contributed with the analysis of the new legislation for registration of vaccines against leishmaniasis by the Ministry of Health in Brazil and is actively engaged in Theses advising and teaching of Vaccinology and Vaccine development at the University for under graduate and Post-Graduate students (from Brazil, Peru, Mexico and Ecuador), aiming to the increase of the number of scientists engaged in Vaccine development and of the number of vaccines used in Public Health. At present Dr Palatnik de Sousa initiated the development of new vaccine formulations against Dengue and Avian flu in the murine models.

Dr. Kalyanasundaram Ramaswamy is a Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and Head of the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the College of Medicine, University of Illinois, USA. He earned his DVM and Masters in Veterinary Science degree from the Kerala Agricultural University India and completed his PhD degree in Parasite Immunology from the University of Calgary, Canada. After completing his postdoctoral training at Cornell University, NY he joined the University of Illinois, College of Medicine in 1993. Currently he is also the Vice President of Dermaegis, a start-up company that largely focuses on immunologicals and topical mosquito repellents. Dr. Ramaswamy has published over 88 peer-reviewed manuscripts. Dr. Ramaswamy’s research interest largely focuses on vaccine development against neglected tropical diseases, more specifically vaccine development against lymphatic filariasis and schistosomiasis. In addition, his laboratory has significant interest in functional proteomics of tropical parasitic infections with major focus in identifying and characterizing new vaccine candidates. Dr. Ramaswamy serves on several grant review panels for NIH (VMD and IMM-1), for DOE, for Wellcome trust, for Australian National Research Council and for Instituto Pasteur.

Dr. John Shiver is Vice President, Worldwide Basic Research Franchise Head, Vaccines at Merck Research Laboratories, West Point, Pennsylvania. He is responsible for the worldwide leadership of vaccine basic research for the Infectious Diseases Franchise leading the teams of scientists working to develop novel vaccines against a broad range of diseases, including HIV/AIDS, human papillomavirus, rotavirus, zoster, influenza and bacterial infections.

Dr. Shiver has gained international recognition in the scientific community for his leadership of Merck’s novel HIV vaccine research program. He has led Merck’s HIV-1 vaccine research team since 1992 playing an instrumental role in the development of vaccines based on gene delivery technologies and of quantitative immunological assays to measure T cell immune responses.

After graduating with a B.S. degree in Chemistry/Mathematics from Wofford College, Dr. Shiver received a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Florida, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Biophysics at Purdue University. He joined Merck in 1991 following four years as a Senior Staff Fellow in the Experimental Immunology Branch of the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health. Dr. Shiver is an Editorial Board Member for the Journal of Virology and Drug Discovery Today: Disease Mechanisms. He is a member of the NIH HIV-1 Vaccine Testing Network Laboratory Science Advisory Committee and the Aeras Immunology Technical Advisory Group (a nonprofit group dedicated to the development of tuberculosis vaccines), and the External Steering Committee for the Emory University Vaccine Center. He is on the Executive Board of the International Society of Vaccines and the Scientific Advisory Board of the Seattle Biomedical Research Institute. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania College of Medicine in Philadelphia.

Dr. Shiver is the author of more than 100 articles that have been published in leading scientific journals, including Science, Nature, Cell, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In addition, Dr. Shiver is a co-author of 24 awarded patents covering his contributions in the field of novel vaccine development.

Dr. Ray Spier was educated at Christ Church, Oxford and UC, London in Chemistry, Biochemistry (First Class Honours), Chemical Microbiology and Biochemical Engineering, after which he spent 7 years as a Senior Process Engineer in industry, 10 years at the Animal Virus Research Institute scaling-up bioreactors for virus vaccine production processes and 14 years at the University of Surrey as Professor and Head of Microbiology. In 1997 he was appointed Professor of Science and Engineering Ethics.

His publication record includes over 200 research papers and reviews, 22 edited books, two encyclopedias and a monograph entitled ‘Ethics, Tools and the Engineer’. He currently edits the journals, ‘Vaccine’ and ‘Science and Engineering Ethics’ which he founded along with the European Society for Animal Cell Technology in 1975 and the International Society for Vaccines in 1996. He was elevated to be President of the European Association for Higher Education in Biotechnology in 2000 and in 2006 he was nominated for a World Technology Award in Ethics. In 2008 he was adopted as the Standing President of the International Society for Vaccines.

Dr. Richard (Dick) Strugnell is Professor of Microbiology in the Department of Microbiology & Immunology at The University of Melbourne. While fundamentally an experimentalist, and having worked in anti-bacterial immunity and vaccine development in the 25 years since my PhD was conferred, I also have an interest in the commercial aspects of vaccine development. I worked at Wellcome Biotech in the late 1980s during the period when the acellular pertussis vaccine was being developed, now consult to several large and small vaccine developers and manufacturers, and sit on the Board of a small start-up vaccine company, Imvaxyn, which is headquartered in the US. My research in recent years has focussed on the development of Salmonella sp. as vaccine vectors, culminating in a Gates Foundation-funded Grand Challenge in Global Health project that is examining the technology in the context of a new pneumococcal vaccine. I have been a Regional Editor for VACCINE for more than 10 years.