Senior Research Scientists | Emory University

Sailaja Gangadhara

Research Associate/Instructor

Sailaja’s research focus is on understanding the pathogenesis and immune correlates for HIV/AIDS with a major focus on the development of novel prophylactic vaccines and therapeutic approaches to control HIV/AIDS, M.tubeculosis/TB, SARS-CoV-2/COVID19 and Hepatitis-C virus.SARS-CoV2,MTB, HCV, and production, characterization of vaccine stocks for mice studies, macaque trails and SHIV and SARS -CoV2 challenge studies. Assaying antigen specific humoral immune responses including antigen specific Ab, Avidity, ADCC responses, protection correlates in rhesus vaccine and challenge trials. Studying rectal biopsy challenges ex vivo with challenge virus to measure protection correlate of vaccine induced T cell and humoral immune responses.

Sailaja received her PhD from IISc Bangalore in 1996.

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Sheikh Abdul Rahman

Research Associate/Instructor

sheikh.abdul.rahman@emory.edu

Abdul is leading studies aimed at developing DNA/MVA vaccine-based cure strategies against human viruses such as HIV, HCV, and SARS-CoV-2. He is investigating vaccine-induced immunological responses against the virus in tissue compartments and their protective role. Abdul did his first postdoc in molecular HIV virology at National Institutes of Health and received his PhD in basic HIV virology from University of Heidelberg - Germany.

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Nanda Kishore Routhu

Research Associate/Instructor

nrouthu@emory.edu

Nanda currently leads multidisciplinary studies involving the development of DNA and Modified Vaccinia Ankara vector (MVA)-based vaccines for highly infectious diseases like corona virus disease (COVID-19) and Tuberculosis (TB). His current research focuses on assessing the vaccine-induced safety profiles, protective humoral and cellular immune responses against SARS-CoV-2 infection and protection studies. He received his Ph.D. in Virology at Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, India. He is formerly trained to study virus-host interactions to identify therapeutic targets, and to development of therapeutics agents for improved clinical outcomes.

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Samuel David Stampfer

Instructor

samuel.david.stampfer@emory.edu

Sam Stampfer is a physician scientist and infectious diseases fellow at Emory University. He completed his MD/PhD at Tufts in 2015 with his PhD in biochemistry in Katya Heldwein's virology lab, where he used X-ray crystallography and other structural techniques to study the mechanism of herpesvirus entry as mediated by glycoprotein B. Subsequently, he worked to develop novel broadly-active filovirus and coronavirus vaccines in Chinglai Yang's lab at Emory. In the Amara lab he works on novel SARS-CoV-2 vaccines designed to maintain activity against strains with immune escape mutations that diminish the efficacy of currently-licensed vaccines. In his free time, he enjoys ultimate frisbee, board games, beer tastings, and hiking expeditions.

Tiffany Styles

Associate Research Scientist

t.m.turner@emory.edu

Tiffany personally wanted to pursue a career in research because she wanted to impact the world. What other way to achieve that goal than to study HIV vaccine development? HIV affects more than 36 million people worldwide. She got that opportunity in 2014 when she started my postdoctoral research in Rama Amara’s Lab. She is currently working on a SHIV vaccine in non-human primates (rhesus macaques). Our vaccine approach utilizes the DNA and Modified Vaccinia Ankara (MVA) virus vaccine modality combined with a protein boost to potentially protect against a heterologous SHIV challenge. Using a SHIV vaccine and SHIV challenge can translate to HIV vaccine research because the envelope in this model is derived from HIV and not SIV. With positive results, we hope to proceed to clinical trial where we can potentially halt the spread of this disease for future generations.

Tiffany received her PhD from University of Georgia in 2013 and started as a post-doc in the Amara lab.

Pooja M. Tiwari

Associate Research Scientist

pooja.tiwari@emory.edu

Pooja’s research interests include developing antiviral therapeutics and vaccines utilizing nucleic acid-based technologies including DNA and mRNA-based vaccines. Before joining Amara lab, Pooja worked on the development of mRNA-based therapeutics against RSV, Influenza and SARS-CoV-2. She received her PhD in 2014 from Alabama State University.

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