Experimental Herpes Vaccine Upends Traditional Approach and Shows Promise

1 Comment

Experimental Herpes Vaccine Upends Traditional Approach and Shows Promise

From Einstein News:

"Scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have designed a new type of vaccine that could be the first-ever for preventing genital herpes—one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases, affecting some 500 million people worldwide. By using a counterintuitive scientific approach, researchers were able to prevent both active and latent infections caused by herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2), the virus that causes genital herpes. Findings from the research, conducted in mice, were published today in the online journal eLife."

 Read the entire article here.

1 Comment

Solution to a 25-year-old Mystery

Comment

Solution to a 25-year-old Mystery

Dr. Jacobs' Inaugural Article as a new member of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in the September 2, 2014 issue of PNAS describes the discovery that the efficient plasmid transformation (ept) phenotype of mc(^2)155 is caused by a loss-of-function mutation in a gene.

Read the Article: Noncanonical SMC protein in Mycobacterium smegmatisrestricts maintenance of Mycobacterium fortuitum plasmids

Read the Biological Profile of Dr. Jacobs as a new NAS member

Comment

UAB Alumni Profile

Comment

UAB Alumni Profile

Phages of Change

UAB Alumnus Revolutionizes Tuberculosis Research

By Meghan Davis

Bill Jacobs cracked one of the great problems in infectious disease research using a mathematician's heart, a molecular biologist's training, and a helpful handful of dirt.

Jacobs, a professor of immunology, microbiology, and genetics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, earned one of the top honors in American science when he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2013. He won the honor, in part, for identifying new ways to target tuberculosis, which is still one of the world's great public health threats. But Jacobs, who earned his Ph.D. in molecular cell biology at UAB in 1985, says it all might not have happened apart from a fateful letter to Birmingham.

While studying math at Edinboro State College near Erie, Pennsylvania (actress Sharon Stone was a classmate), Jacobs took a microbiology course that sparked his interest. He applied to several microbiology graduate programs, but few even bothered to answer his inquiry letters. Then Roy Curtiss, Ph.D., founder of UAB's molecular cell biology graduate program, invited him to Birmingham for an interview and tour.

"I told Roy that I didn't know much biology," Jacobs says. "And he told me, 'There is no sin in being ignorant. The sin is to remain ignorant.' I decided that from that day forward, I wasn't going to be ashamed to ask questions in seminars."

Jacobs says he still uses Curtiss's quote to encourage his own students.

Comment