Beyond Fauci: Meet the Science Superheroes Leading the U.S. COVID-19 Response

MEDIFIND
October 21, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic has been a world-changing event, forcing all of us to spend a lot of time thinking about change. More than ever, we’re inquiring about how diseases evolve, how new treatments and procedures are developed and adopted, and how up-and-coming experts are bringing new ideas and new ways of thinking to the medical landscape. We know that 2020 has brought a lot of new changes and concepts to the forefront of life.

Trump Administration Expands Collaboration with AstraZeneca to Develop and Manufacture an Investigational Monoclonal Antibody to Prevent COVID-19

October 9, 2020
To meet the Trump Administration's Operation Warp Speed goals, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Department of Defense (DoD ) today announced an agreement with AstraZeneca for late-stage development and large-scale manufacturing of the company's COVID-19 investigational product AZD7442, a cocktail of two monoclonal antibodies, that may help treat or prevent infection with SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

Kristen Reeder

Kristen
Reeder
Associate Basic Scientist

Dr. Reeder received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences in 2017 from the University of Alabama at Birmingham with a concentration in Immunology. Kristen’s dissertation examined the role of common gamma-chain cytokines in Aspergillus fumigatus lung diseases including: models of invasive aspergillosis and fungal associated asthma.

She accepted a post-doctoral training position with Dr. Casey Weaver’s lab at UAB in 2018. There she studied the effects of IL-2 on the Th17/Th22 developmental pathways in a gut model of Citrobacter rodentium infection. In 2020, Kristen joined Dr. James Crowe’s lab at Vanderbilt Vaccine Center as a staff scientist.

kristen.m.reeder@vumc.org
ReederKristen

Discoveries in Action Podcast Episode 2 - Vaccines: Pandemics vs. Prosperity

September 4, 2020
How did the social good and necessity of vaccines get up for debate? Hear from vaccine experts on what they think lead to vaccine hesitancy, and then why it’s increasingly important to buoy people’s understanding of the science. In short, there are more pathogens lurking that could cause harm -- and they hopscotch around the world faster. But technology and research is in a sprint to stay ahead. Tune in to Vaccines: Pandemics vs. Prosperity.   Check out episode 2 of the podcast here!

How a secretive Pentagon agency seeded the ground for a rapid coronavirus cure

Paul Sonne
July 30, 2020
The scientists were working through the night over a weekend in February in their Vancouver offices, running a blood sample from an early American covid-19 survivor through a credit card-sized device made up of 200,000 tiny chambers, hoping to help save the world. Their mission was part of a program under the Pentagon’s secretive technology research agency. The goal: to find a way to produce antibodies for any virus in the world within 60 days of collecting a blood sample from a survivor.

Research team isolates antibodies that may prevent rare polio-like illness in children linked to a respiratory infection

July 3, 2020
Researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Purdue University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison have isolated human monoclonal antibodies that potentially can prevent a rare but devastating polio-like illness in children linked to a respiratory viral infection. The illness, called acute flaccid myelitis (AFM), causes sudden weakness in the arms and legs following a fever or respiratory illness. More than 600 cases have been identified since the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began tracking the disease in 2014.

Antibodies eye Pacific Island “fever”

Bill Snyder
May 14, 2020
Ross River fever is a mosquito-transmitted disease endemic to Australia and surrounding Pacific Islands. There is no specific treatment or vaccine for Ross River virus (RRV) infection, which causes rash, fever and debilitating muscle and joint pain lasting three to six months. 
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