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HIV

This human T cell (blue) is under attack by HIV (yellow), the virus that causes AIDS. The virus specifically targets T cells, which play a critical role in the body's immune response against invaders like bacteria and viruses. Image courtesy of Seth Pincus, Elizabeth Fischer and Austin Athman, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health. Part of the exhibit Life:Magnified by ASCB and NIGMS.

Since the first diagnosis in the United States in 1982, the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has gone on to become a global pandemic with over 35 million people around the world now living with the infection, including more than 1 million people in the US.

Yale School of Public Health has a long history in research on the disease starting with pioneering efforts in the late 1980s that led to the establishment of one of the first needle exchange programs in the US to stem transmission of the virus through intravenous drug use. In the department, Professor Robert Heimer and Associate Professor Kaveh Khoshnood, were among the team that was involved in the program’s launch.

Dr. Heimer continues to study HIV and other infections (hepatitis B and C) in the context of the health of injection drug users using a combination of laboratory, operational, behavioral and structural analyses to evaluate interventions to reduce the harms associated with injecting both in the US and in Eastern Europe. Dr. Khoshnood continues his work on the health of drug users in the US and abroad, but his research focuses on a broader range of at risk populations including prisoners, and examines the relationship between HIV, ethics and human rights.

Research to understand the structural and social determinants of risk for HIV, including mass incarceration, housing instability, and subsidized housing policies is a focus of the work of Professor Linda M. Niccolai and her research methods include surveillance, behavioral epidemiology, and qualitative approaches. She is also the Director of the Development Core for Yale School of Public Health’s Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS (CIRA).

As part of YSPH’s robust public health modeling concentration, Professor Alison P. Galvani and Associate Professor Ted Cohen, focus their research on mathematical modeling of HIV and other infectious diseases. Dr. Galvani’s research focuses on integrating epidemiology, evolutionary ecology and economics in order to generate predictions about HIV that could not be made by these disciplines alone. Dr. Cohen’s work focuses on the interaction between HIV and tuberculosis (TB) and combines mathematical modeling, fieldwork, and analysis of programmatic data to understand how TB drug-resistance and medical comorbidities such as HIV frustrate current efforts to control epidemics.

Associate Professor Luke Davis' HIV-related research projects use implementation science to advance integrative models of care for persons living with HIV and related pulmonary complications, especially diagnostic evaluation, case finding, and linkage to care for TB. Capacity-building is built into these projects wherever possible through a Fogarty International Center Pulmonary Complications of AIDS Research Training Grant.

YSPH Former Dean Sten H. Vermund is another early pioneer in AIDS research and one of the world’s leading experts on HIV prevention. In the mid-1980s, Dean Vermund helped establish the first adolescent health clinic that provided some of the earliest care to HIV-infected youth in New York City. His early showed that HIV was a risk factor for cervical cancer, which motivated routine cervical cancer screening for HIV-infected women worldwide. In 2000, he founded the Centre for Infectious Disease Research, now one of Zambia’s largest NGOs, which currently supports more than 330 clinics that play an instrumental role in the prevention of maternal-fetal HIV transmission and the implementation of antiretroviral therapy.

Assistant Professor Gregg S. Gonsalves’ research focuses on the use of quantitative models for improving the response to HIV. He is also co-director of the Yale Law School/Yale School of Public Health Global Health Justice Partnership. For more than 20 years, he worked on HIV/AIDS and other global health issues with several organizations, including the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, the Treatment Action Group, Gay Men’s Health Crisis, and the AIDS and Rights Alliance for Southern Africa.

Debbie Humphries, clinical instructor, is interested in how community research capacity can strengthen prevention and intervention efforts to address the HIV epidemic, whether globally or in the United States. She is currently working on developing a tool to assess community research capacity, and has piloted the tool in collaboration with CIRA (Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS).

Lauretta Grau, Research Scientist, is also using qualitative and mixed methods studies of the HIV Care Continuum, technology-based interventions to assist in smoking cessation and substance abuse treatment, and the epidemiology of opioid-involved fatalities. She has also led qualitative studies on such topics as the quality of healthcare delivery, repeat medical hospitalizations and access to medication-assisted treatment for opioid use disorder.

There is an extensive group of research scientists, faculty with secondary appointments in the department and volunteer and adjunct faculty with interests in and doing research on HIV.

Faculty of Interest

  • Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases)

    Research Interests
    • Drug Resistance, Microbial
    • Epidemiology
    • Europe, Eastern
    • Models, Biological
    • Public Health
    • South America
    • Tuberculosis
    • HIV Infections
    • Molecular Epidemiology
    • Africa South of the Sahara
    Dr. Cohen is an infectious disease epidemiologist whose primary research focus is tuberculosis. He is particularly interested in understanding how TB drug-resistance and medical comorbidities such as HIV frustrate current efforts to control epidemics, with an ultimate goal of developing more effective approaches to limit the morbidity caused by this pathogen. Dr. Cohen's training is in epidemiology and clinical medicine, and his work includes mathematical modeling, fieldwork, and analysis of programmatic data. His research program is currently funded by NIH and US CDCAwards.
  • Associate Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases) and of Medicine (Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine); Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Director, Implementation Science Track

    Research Interests
    • Critical Care
    • Tuberculosis
    • Global Health
    • Mobile Applications
    • COVID-19
    I am a pulmonary and critical care physician and clinical epidemiologist using implementation science to find, treat, and prevent tuberculosis (TB) and HIV, two of the leading cause of death due to infection worldwide. I teach and mentor students and direct a graduate program on implementation science at the Yale School of Public Health. I am also involved in several international research training programs focused on implementation science. I am also a Yale Medicine physician, and attend in the Medical Intensive Care Unit and the Winchester TB Clinic at Yale-New Haven Hospital, caring for patients and their families and teaching medical students, residents, and fellows.
  • Burnett and Stender Families Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Director of the Center for Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis (CIDMA)

    Research Interests
    • Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
    • Africa, Southern
    • Ecology
    • Economics
    • Epidemiologic Methods
    • Epidemiology
    • Biological Evolution
    • HIV
    • Influenza, Human
    • Parasitology
    • Public Health
    • Tuberculosis
    • Global Health
    • Evolution, Planetary
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    Alison Galvani, Ph.D., is the founding director of the Yale Center for Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis (CIDMA) and the Burnett and Stender Families Professor of Epidemiology at the Yale School of Public Health, Yale School of Medicine. She has applied her modelling and health economics skills to address myriad public health challenges, including HIV/AIDS, Zika, Ebola, influenza, and COVID-19. In 2015, Galvani became the youngest faculty member ever appointed to an endowed chair in the history of the Yale School of Medicine. She earned her Ph.D. and B.A. from the University of Oxford.
  • Associate Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Associate (Adjunct) Professor of Law, Yale Law School; Affiliated Faculty, Program in Addiction Medicine; Co-Director, Global Health Justice Partnership; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health

    Research Interests
    • Computer Simulation
    • Decision Making
    • Hepatitis C
    • HIV
    • Operations Research
    • Political Systems
    • Prisoners
    • Public Policy
    • Social Justice
    • Social Medicine
    • Tuberculosis
    • United States Food and Drug Administration
    • Causality
    • Drug Approval
    • Drug Users
    • Social Determinants of Health
    Gregg Gonsalves is an expert in policy modeling on infectious disease and substance use, as well as the intersection of public policy and health equity. His research focuses on the use of quantitative models for improving the response to epidemic diseases. For more than 30 years, he worked on HIV/AIDS and other global health issues with several organizations, including the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, the Treatment Action Group, Gay Men’s Health Crisis, and the AIDS and Rights Alliance for Southern Africa. He is a 2011 graduate of Yale College and received his PhD from Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences/School of Public Health in 2017. He is currently the public health correspondent for The Nation. He is a 2018 MacArthur Fellow.
  • Research Scientist

    Research Interests
    • Attitude
    • HIV
    • Psychiatry and Psychology
    Dr. Grau is a clinical psychologist with training in health psychology and expertise in identifying the cognitive and emotional correlates of risk and preventive health behaviors. She has been involved in the fields of HIV and hepatitis prevention research for over two decades during which time she has worked with syringe services programs (SSPs) and community-based organizations in the U.S., Russia, Vietnam, and Ecuador. Dr. Grau has been involved in multisite, longitudinal evaluations of SSPs and public health interventions implemented through SSPs and emergency departments.  She has experience working with sexually active adolescents, minority and substance-using populations, and people who inject drugs and their families. More recently, her research interests have included qualitative and mixed methods studies of the HIV Care Continuum, technology-based interventions to assist in smoking cessation and substance abuse treatment, and the epidemiology of opioid-involved fatalities.  She has also led qualitative studies on such topics as the quality of healthcare delivery, repeat medical hospitalizations, and access to medication-assisted treatment for opioid use disorder.
  • Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases) and of Pharmacology; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health

    Research Interests
    • Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
    • Epidemiology
    • Foodborne Diseases
    • Hepatitis C
    • Injections
    • Public Health
    • Russia
    • Vietnam
    • Global Health
    • HIV Infections
    Dr. Heimer's major research efforts include scientific investigation of the mortality and morbidity associated with injection drug use. Areas of investigation include syringe exchange programs, virus survival in syringes, hepatitis B vaccination, hepatitis C transmission risks, overdose prevention and resuscitation, and pharmacological treatment of opiate addiction. His research combines laboratory, operational, behavioral, and structural analyses to evaluate the effectiveness of intervention programs in preventing the negative medical consequences of injection drug use. Dr. Heimer is a member of Yale’s Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS (CIRA) and former Director of its Interdisciplinary Research Methods Core. His current work focuses on the contexts and consequences of the opioid crisis in CT and the systemic of HIV, viral hepatitis, and injection drug use nationally and globally. Dr. Heimer previously served as Principal Investigator of the Yale office of the Connecticut Emerging Infections Program. This Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-funded program is one of ten programs nationwide that seek to assess, through population-based surveillance, the public health impact of emerging infectious diseases and to evaluate methods for their prevention and control in the community. The Yale program currently focuses on foodborne illnesses, and respiratory illnesses (especially influenza), Lyme and other tickborne diseases, Clostridium difficile, and the prevention of human papillomavirus infections. Dr. Heimer received his training in molecular biology and pharmacology at Columbia College (BA) and Yale University (MA, PhD). He began his work on the prevention of HIV among injection drug users in 1990 with an evaluation of the city-run New Haven needle exchange program and his work on emerging infections in 1995 with studies of the tick-borne agent of human ehrlichiosis.
  • Associate Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Program Co-Director, Global Health Ethics Program, Yale Institute for Global Health

    Research Interests
    • Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
    • Epidemiology
    • Ethics
    • HIV
    • Human Rights
    • Public Health
    • Violence
    • Global Health
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    Dr. Khoshnood is an Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies at the Yale School of Public Health and executive committee member at Yale Council on Middle East Studies. He is Faculty Director for Humanitarian Research Lab. Dr. Khoshnood is trained as an infectious disease epidemiologist and has more than three decades of domestic and international experience in HIV prevention research among people who use drugs and other at-risk populations. Dr. Khoshnood's research interests include: 1) epidemiology and prevention of HIV/AIDS, 2) research ethics and 3) humanitarian health.
  • Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Director, HPV Working Group at Yale; Director, CT Emerging Infections Program at Yale, Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases

    Research Interests
    • Epidemiologic Methods
    • Epidemiology
    • HIV
    • Sexually Transmitted Diseases
    • Vaccines
    • Communicable Diseases, Emerging
    • Qualitative Research
    • Human papillomavirus 11
    Linda Niccolai is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at Yale School of Public Health and Professor in the Department of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases. She is an internationally recognized scholar in infectious disease epidemiology with specific interests in vaccine-preventable diseases and sexually transmitted infections. Her vaccinology research focuses on understanding uptake, impact, and effectiveness of HPV and other adolescent vaccines with an emphasis on addressing health disparities. Her STI research focuses on social and behavioral aspects of transmission dynamics and prevention. Funded by a diverse grant portfolio (NIH, CDC, and private foundations), her work is interdisciplinary by design and includes behavioral and clinical epidemiology, surveillance, and qualitative approaches. As Director of the CT Emerging Infections at Yale, she oversees a large program of public health surveillance and applied epidemiology research focused on respiratory viruses (including SARS-CoV-2), foodborne illness, healthcare associated infections at the community interface, and HPV vaccine impact. Dr. Niccolai is currently on the editorial board for Sexually Transmitted Diseases, and she has served as an adviser and reviewer for National Institutes of Health (including serving as chair of Health Promotion in Communities study section) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conferences and grant programs. She participated as a Fellow in the 2023-2024 Hedwig van Ameringen Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine® (ELAM) Program, a prestigious leadership program committed to advancing women for leadership positions in academic medicine. Dr. Niccolai received her Sc.M. at Harvard School of Public Health and her Ph.D. at Tulane University. She has been teaching epidemiology methods courses to MPH, MS, and PhD students for over 20 years.
  • Anna M.R. Lauder Professor of Public Health

    Research Interests
    • Environment and Public Health
    • HIV
    • Public Health
    • Global Health
    • Women's Health
    • Child Health
    Dr. Sten Vermund is a pediatrician and infectious disease epidemiologist focused on diseases of low and middle income countries. His work on HIV-HPV interactions among women in Bronx methadone programs motivated a change in the 1993 CDC AIDS case surveillance definition and inspired cervical cancer screening programs launched within HIV/AIDS programs around the world. The thrust of his research has focused on health care access, adolescent sexual and reproductive health and rights, and prevention of  HIV transmission among general and key populations, including mother-to-child.  Dr. Vermund has become increasingly engaged in health policy, particularly around sustainability of HIV/AIDS programs and their expansion to non-communicable diseases, coronavirus pandemic response and prevention, and public health workforce development. His recent grants include capacity-building for public health in Chad, molecular epidemiology for HIV in Kazakhstan, and COVID-19 vaccine studies in Dominican Republic and Connecticut. He has worked with schools and arts organizations for COVID-19 risk mitigation and institutional safety.

Secondary & Adjunct Faculty

  • Professor of Medicine (Infectious Diseases) and of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Director, Yale Center for Clinical and Community Research, Department of Medicine; Director, HIV in Prisons Program, Infectious Diseases; Director, Community Health Care Van, Intersection of Infectious Diseases and Substance Use Disorders/Addiction Medicine; Academic Icon Professor of Medicine, University of Malaya-Centre of Excellence for Research in AIDS (CERiA), Faculty of Medicine , University of Malaya

    Research Interests
    • Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
    • Behavioral Medicine
    • Community Medicine
    • Decision Making
    • Epidemiology
    • Hepatitis, Viral, Human
    • Mobile Health Units
    • Social Medicine
    • Global Health
    • HIV Infections
    • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
    • AIDS-Related Opportunistic Infections
    • Health Status Disparities
    • Healthcare Disparities
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    • Community-Based Participatory Research
    • Chemicals and Drugs
    • Health Care
    • Implementation Science
    Frederick (Rick) L. Altice is a professor of Medicine, Epidemiology and Public Health and is a clinician, clinical epidemiologist, intervention and implementation science researcher at Yale University School of Medicine and School of Public Health. Dr. Altice’s primary research focuses on interventions and implementation science at the interface between infectious diseases and addiction and he has conducted research in several global health settings. He also has a number of projects working in the criminal justice system, including transitional programs addressing infectious diseases, medications for opioid use disorder (methadone, buprenorphine, extended release naltrexone), mental illness, homelessness and social instability. Specific topics include alcohol, opioid, stimulant and nicotine use disorders on HIV treatment outcomes, HIV and addiction treatment, interface with the criminal justice system, and pharmacokinetic drug interactions between treatment for substance use disorders and antiretroviral and tuberculosis therapy. At a basic level, his research focuses on clinical epidemiology, especially in key populations at risk for HIV (e.g., MSM, TGW, PWID, prisoners, sex workers) and development, adaptation and evaluation of of biomedical and behavioral interventions to improve treatment outcomes. His research, however, has evolved and included development and testing of mobile technologies (mHealth) to intervene with key populations to promote health outcomes.  His research is especially concentrated in health services research techniques with a focus on implementation science, seeking to introduce and scale-up evidence-based interventions in numerous contexts. A number of implementation science strategies are underway to examine scale-up of medication-assisted therapies to treat opioid use disorder in community, criminal justice and in primary care settings. Most recently, his work has been augmented through use of decision science techniques to understand and promote patient preferences, including the development of informed and shared decision-making aids. His work has emerged primarily with a global health focus with funded research projects internationally in Malaysia, Ukraine, Moldova, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Peru, and Indonesia. He has participated in projects through the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency, Special Projects of National Significance with HRSA, and the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment. He is currently also collaborating on projects with the WHO, UNAIDS, USAID, PEPFAR and UNODC. Current internationally funded projects in dedicated research sites that are being conducted in Malaysia, Ukraine, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Peru. His research and training sites in Malaysia (2005), Peru (2010) and Ukraine (2005) are dedicated training and research sites for the Global Health Equity Scholars Fogarty Training Program and the Doris Duke International Fellowship program. He is currently the director for two International Implementation Science Research and Training Centers with collaborations between Yale University and the University of Malaya and Sichuan University.
  • Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Medicine (Rheumatology) and Professor of Pathology and of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Chief, Rheumatology, Allergy, & Immunology; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Rheumatologist in Chief, Rheumatology, YNHH

    Research Interests
    • Africa
    • Epidemiology
    • Macrophage Migration-Inhibitory Factors
    • Malaria
    • Pathology
    • Public Health
    • Rheumatology
    • Stem Cells
    • Global Health
    • Communicable Diseases, Emerging
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    Richard Bucala, MD, PhD, is Chief, Section of Rheumatology, Allergy & Immunology and the Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Endowed Professor of Medicine, Pathology, and Epidemiology & Public Health. He studies the regulation of the immune system with a focus on how protective responses can lead to immunopathology and disease. His laboratory’s main emphasis is MIF-family cytokines, their role in genetic susceptibility to disease, and their therapeutic targeting for different clinical conditions. The Bucala group is credited with the molecular cloning of MIF and discovery of its critical role in regulating glucocorticoid immunosuppression, which opened novel approaches to therapy in autoimmune inflammatory conditions. His lab also identified the MIF receptor and discovered common polymorphisms in the MIF gene, which show global population stratification. Depending on the nature of the immune or invasive provocation, variant MIF alleles protect from disease or contribute to immunopathology in autoimmunity and in different infections and chronic conditions. His laboratory developed biochips for genetic epidemiology studies of malaria and tuberculosis in resource-limited settings, and his research is leading efforts to develop MIF-based therapies tailored to an individual’s genetic makeup. Dr. Bucala licensed anti-MIF toward the development of Imalumab and his work contributed to the FDA-approved anti-MIF receptor antibody (Milatuzumab). Research partnerships in structure-based drug design have led to novel small molecule MIF modulators for use in autoimmune, oncologic, and infectious diseases. The function of the MIF-like genes expressed by the parasites responsible for malaria, leishmaniasis, and helminthic infection also are under investigation. As these proteins were discovered to uniquely suppress immunologic memory, they offer new targets for vaccination against these infections. Dr. Bucala further is credited with the discovery of the circulating fibrocyte, which is being targeted therapeutically in different fibrosing disorders. He co-founded two biotechnology companies, including the startup MIFCOR begun as a student-advised project. He attends in the Yale New Haven Health System in-patient service and is the past Editor-in-Chief of Arthritis & Rheumatology. Dr. Bucala was elected to the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians and has served on advisory boards for the UN, the federal government, the pharmaceutical industry, academia, and private foundations.
  • Professor Emeritus; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Professor Emeritus of Medicine and Epidemiology and Public Health; Senior Research Scientist, Infectious Diseases

    Research Interests
    • Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
    • Africa, Southern
    • Epidemiology
    • HIV
    • Public Health
    • Tuberculosis
    • Global Health
    • Anti-Retroviral Agents
    • Extensively Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    • Geographicals
    I have focused my career in medicine and infectious diseases on creating new knowledge to improve the health of marginalized and underserved populations in the US and globally. I have been involved in HIV/AIDS care, teaching and research since 1981. I served as Director of the Yale AIDS Program from 1991 to 2009. More recently, although still working domestically on HIV/AIDS, a major focus my work has been to integrate HIV and TB care and treatment in co infected patients in South Africa with the aim of improving diagnosis, treatment and outcomes of both diseases. This has led to the recognition of the epidemic of extensively drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR TB) in Tugela Ferry in rural KwaZuluNatal South Africa and now focuses on the diagnosis, treatment and reduction of transmission of XDR TB and multiple drug resistant (MDR) TB and in HIV co-infected patients. During my career, I have developed multidisciplinary teams and constructed observational studies, clinical trials and operational research in community and health care settings to address complex infectious diseases challenges. I have also served as a mentor for students, residents, fellows and faculty and other health care workers in the US and multiple international sites, with a current and continuing focus in rural South Africa.
  • Professor in the Practice (Microbial Diseases); Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health

    Dr. Hecht joined Yale College faculty in 2014 as a lecturer at the Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, where he continues to teach a senior global health capstone course. In 2017, Dr. Hecht was appointed as a clinical professor at the Yale School of Public Health and has since instructed a course for second-year MPH students on improving health reform and health system management, organization, and financing in low and middle-income countries.Concurrently, Dr. Robert Hecht is the President of Pharos Global Health Advisors. He has more than 30 years of experience in global health, nutrition and development, in senior management positions with the World Bank, UNAIDS, the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative and Results for Development. Rob is a widely recognized thought leader and policy analyst with a strong track record of advice to top decision makers and dozens of publications related to immunization, HIV, health financing, health sector reform, and nutrition.
  • Ann Kurth, PhD, CNM, MPH, FAAN is Dean and Linda Koch Lorimer Professor, Yale University School of Nursing, and Professor of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases, Yale School of Public Health. Dr. Kurth is an elected Fellow of the National Academy of Medicine, and of the American Academy of Nursing; and is a member of the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering. She served on the US Preventive Services Task Force which sets screening and prevention guidelines for the nation. An epidemiologist and clinically-trained nurse-midwife, Dean Kurth’s research focuses on HIV/reproductive health and global health system strengthening. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIAID, NIDA, NIMH, NICHD), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, UNAIDS, CDC, HRSA, and others, for studies conducted in the United States and internationally. She chairs the Consortium of Universities for Global Health (CUGH), the 190+-university member academic global health association. Dr. Kurth has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles, chapters, and scholarly monographs. She has received awards for her science and leadership including Friends of the National Institute of Nursing Research Award and Sigma Theta Tau International Researcher Hall of Fame award. She chairs the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) Board on Global Health, and is a member of the NAM Climate and Health Initiative.
  • John F. Enders Professor of Pediatrics (Infectious Disease) and Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases) and of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry

    Research Interests
    • Biophysics
    • Pediatrics
    • Sarcoma, Kaposi
    • Virology
    • Epstein-Barr Virus Infections
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    Dr. Miller’s laboratory studies the mechanisms underlying the switch between latency and lytic replication of two oncogenic herpesviruses, Epstein-Barr virus and Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus. Current experiments explore how viral and cellular transcription factors that selectively bind to methylated DNA control expression of viral and cellular genes, how cellular gene expression is selectively inhibited while viral gene expression is enhanced, and how viral DNA replication is regulated by cellular proteins. Recent studies focus on a new class of anti-viral agents that inhibit reactivation of Epstein-Barr virus from latency into lytic infection.
  • Professor Adjunct in Pediatrics; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health; Professor of Pediatrics (Infectious Diseases), Pediatrics; Professor, Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases; Professor of Pharmacology, Molecular Medicine, Pharmacology, and Physiology; Professor of Management, School of Management

    Research Interests
    • Brazil
    • Ghana
    • Hepatitis C
    • HIV
    • Pediatrics
    • Pharmacology
    • Molecular Epidemiology
    • HIV Reverse Transcriptase
    • Infectious Disease Medicine
    The Paintsil laboratory focuses on increasing our understanding of the host determinants of individual differences in response to antiretroviral therapy; biomarkers and pathogenesis of increasing incidence of cancers in HIV treatment-experienced individuals.