School of Medicine

We are working to develop biomarkers for cancer of the central nervous system. In particular, we are studying ways to detect tumor derived DNA in the CSF of individuals with brain cancers. We hope the levels of tumor derived DNA can be used to aid in clinical decision making.

Dr. Bollinger is the Raj and Kamla Gupta Professor of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Medicine, and he holds joint appointments in International Health at the Johns Hopkins (JH) Bloomberg School of Public Health, and in Community Public Health at the JH School of Nursing. He is the Founding Director of the JH Center for Clinical Global Health Education (now CCGHE-ID), Associate Director for Medicine of the JH Center for Global Health, and serves on the Advisory Team for the Johns Hopkins Precision Medicine Center of Excellence for COVID-19. He is board certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine in internal medicine and infectious diseases.

Dr. Burd developed a research program studying the pathogenesis of fetal brain injury with exposure to intrauterine inflammation. She studies prenatally used neuroprotective agents that could be used in utero to prevent cerebral palsy and a spectrum of neurobehavioral outcomes.

Our group’s work in India is focused on computational and molecular methods for improving HIV- and hepatitis C-related outcomes among key populations, such as people who inject drugs and men who have sex with men. We utilize social and spatial network analysis and phylogenetic models to understand viral transmission dynamics and are exploring machine learning methods to optimize treatment and prevention for HIV and hepatitis C.

I work on freely circulating or encapsulated inside exosomes RNA-based diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers.

Dr. Dawson has made important discoveries on how neurons die in genetic and sporadic models of Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Dawson's discoveries are enabling clinical strategies for disease modifying therapies and biomarkers for Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer's disease as well as other neurodegenerative disorders.

I am broadly interested in infectious diseases. I direct a TB elimination campaign–Zero TB Kids–that seeks to eliminate TB for Tibetan refugee children using a multi-pronged approach of community mobilization, screening, treatment, and preventive therapy. Additionally, I am engaged in implementation and clinical research related to Covid-19 vaccine strategies and hepatitis B control, and etiologic research on H. pylori infection and related gastric cancer.

Charles W. Flexner, MD, is the Principal Investigator of the Long Acting/Extended Release Antiretroviral Resource Program (LEAP). He is Professor of Medicine in the Divisions of Clinical Pharmacology and Infectious Diseases, and Professor of Pharmacology and Molecular Sciences in the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is also Professor of International Health in the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Flexner is an expert on the basic and clinical pharmacology of drugs for HIV/AIDS and related infections, including viral hepatitis and tuberculosis. His scientific contributions include work on the important roles of pharmacokinetic enhancement, adherence, and dosing frequency in the long-term management of HIV/AIDS.

We are interested in studying molecular abnormalities that underlie diseases to design targeted molecular therapies. Specifically, alterations in the regulation and protein: protein interaction due to mutations are implicated from cardiovascular disease to cancer. Understanding the structural and mechanistic details of each signaling event and the protein-protein interactions involved is our key to design the next generation of targeted therapies.

My clinical and research focus is on glomerular diseases with a special interest in small vessel vasculitis.

Jonathan Golub, PhD, MPH brings more than 20 years of experience focusing on the epidemiology, detection, and prevention of TB in low and middle-income countries and the many drivers associated with TB acquisition, progression, and treatment outcomes. He is a Professor of Medicine, Epidemiology, and International Health at the Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health. He is experienced in developing and implementing research studies for TB in Brazil, South Africa and India, leading and managing large research teams in these countries. Current NIH grants that he is leading include: implementation of a new test and treat strategy for latent TB infection among people with HIV in Brazil (PREVINE); an RCT comparing strategies for detecting recurrent TB among people who have completed TB treatment in India, and extent of pulmonary impairment at the end of TB treatment and beyond (TB Aftermath); an RCT comparing strategies for pulmonary rehabilitation for reducing pulmonary impairment among people with TB in India (TB PuRe); and an RCT comparing smoking cessation interventions among people with HIV in South Africa (Tlogela). Previously, he has led smoking cessation studies and tobacco prevalence studies among people with HIV and people with TB patients in several LMICs and he has also investigated the impact of diabetes on TB outcomes in India. He is currently leading implementation research studies looking at novel ways to increase TB preventive therapy among HIV-infected patients in several African countries through Unitaid’s IMPAACT4TB. He is currently the JHU Research Development Team Lead Investigator, overseeing the SMART4TB Technical Area teams at JHU and with partners for the USAID funded project. He has served on WHO expert panels for operational research and guideline development groups for developing TB screening guidelines. He is actively involved in Fogarty training grants in India and South Africa (currently site-PI with University of Witswatersrand) and was PI for 11 years for a Fogarty HIV/TB training program in Brazil, which was expanded to include trainees from Mozambique, India and Brazil. He is currently Director of the Developmental Core for the JHU Tuberculosis Research Advancement Center (TRAC). Finally, he has taught the Epidemiologic Basis for Tuberculosis Control at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health for 18 years and has taught the course in South Africa, Brazil and India as well.

Wish to engage in capacity building and streamlining clinical operations.

Dr. Gupta is Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. She is also Faculty Co-chair of the Gupta-Klinsky India Institute at Johns Hopkins University, and Professor of Infectious Diseases at the JH School of Medicine, with a joint appointment in International Health at the JH Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Dr. Anita Gupta is an adjunct assistant professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine and pain medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Her areas of clinical expertise include pain medicine, health policy, biotechnology, drug development, corporate and government affairs.

COVID-19, Emergency and Critical Care technical director for the USAID funded RISE project working to building clinical case management capacity and health systems resilience in over 20 states.

Amit Jain, MD is an Associate Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery and Neurosurgery, and Chief of Minimally Invasive Spine Surgery at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Jain is interested in health economics and global surgery. He has strong ties to academic centers in India. He has over 200 publications and multiple research grants.

Since September 2016, I have been performing CDC-supported research to assess the epidemiology of neonatal sepsis in NICUs in India and to develop interventions to reduce rates of sepsis, and a related study was funded in 2018 to assess reservoirs of transmission for organisms associated with sepsis in the NICU. I am particularly interested in describing the epidemiology of colonization and infection with antibiotic-resistant bacteria, including identifying reservoirs of transmission and using novel techniques in healthcare epidemiology to reduce risk of healthcare-associated infections. I receive current NIH support to continue this work in India.

Dr. Karakousis and his team are using a systems biology-based approach to understand the immunological basis of latent tuberculosis infection and reactivation disease. He is interested in identifying novel biomarkers for predicting the risk of reactivation and assessing the adequacy of tuberculosis treatment.

I am interested in medication education and patient safety as it relates to India. Specifically, I am interested in teaching and evaluation/assessment of clinical reasoning in India with the hope of reducing diagnostic errors in the long run.

Dr Kumar’s interests involve the structural, biophysical and molecular basis of tuberculosis pathogenesis and the development of anti-tubercular drugs. His recent work has led to new TB drugs and point-of-care diagnostics against tuberculosis.

I focus on key populations (PWID, MSM) in India, with an aim to improving harm reduction, HIV/HCV prevention, and HIV/HCV treatment. My colleagues and I have conducted large multi-city surveys of key populations in India to characterize epidemiology and HIV/HCV care continua. We have conducted cluster-randomized trials and individual randomized trials to evaluate efficacy. Our work also includes implementation science.

At Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, Sheela N. Magge, MD, MSCE is Director of the Division of Pediatric Endocrinology and the Lawson Wilkins Endowed Chair of Pediatric Endocrinology. Dr. Magge is a clinician investigator dedicated to improving the lives of children with type 2 diabetes, obesity, and insulin resistance, as well as the cardiovascular implications of these conditions. She has performed patient-oriented research throughout her career. She received a NIH K23 award for research on dyslipidemia and CV risk factors in pediatric obesity and type 2 diabetes (2007). She was co-principal investigator of an NIH NICHD R01 study of cardiometabolic risk and obesity in adolescents with Down syndrome, awarded in 2012. She is currently the principal investigator of a 2018 NIH NIDDK R01 award studying the differential cardiometabolic risk among South Asian adolescents in the US, compared with that for African-American and white peers, related to body composition. This study is examining mechanistic differences influencing diabetes risk. Dr Magge is the Johns Hopkins principal investigator of a new NIDDK U01: DISCOVERY study of risk factors for type 2 diabetes among youth, to determine the greatest predictors of developing type 2 diabetes during childhood. Dr. Magge’s expertise led to her appointment to the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Nutrition from 2012-2018. She has numerous peer-reviewed publications.

I have more than 18 years of experience in clinical practice, education, and research in infectious diseases. I direct all clinical research activities for the Indo-JHU program, which conducts phase I, II, and III clinical trials of therapeutic drug interventions for HIV and co-morbid infections, including TB and hepatitis, in adults (including pregnant women) and children in Pune, India. My research interests includes antimicrobial resistance, comorbidities (including diabetes, HIV), and the use of novel tools (Hair PK, whole genome sequencing, host biomarkers) to study TB treatment outcomes.

Her genetics research has contributed immensely to our understanding of the developmental process of X inactivation in human females and its role in sex differences in disease. She is the author of more than 100 research articles and two books: one, about X Inactivation in human females, entitled Females are Mosaics, and the other about her research career, entitled, American Science: My view from the bench. She was the founding director of the Hopkins PhD program in Human Genetics and Molecular Biology.

Dr. Chirag R. Parikh is a Professor of Medicine and the Director of the Division of Nephrology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Parikh was originally from India and attended medical school at Seth G.S. Medical College and KEM Hospital in Mumbai, India. He completed his fellowship in Nephrology and Hypertension and UNOS Transplant Certification at the University of Colorado. While completing his fellowship, he also earned a doctorate in Clinical Investigation. Dr. Parikh has been awarded several active NIH grants, published over 500 original articles, and been cited over 50,000 times in the literature. His research focuses on translating and validating novel biomarkers for the diagnosis and prognosis of acute kidney injury. At Johns Hopkins, Dr. Parikh also directs the Precision Medicine Center of Excellence for Kidney Diseases, which uses data science and machine learning approaches to enable transformative changes in clinical care and research studies that aim to personalize treatment for each patient. Dr. Parikh's influence extends beyond the borders of the United States. He has established fruitful collaborations with the APEX Nephrology Group in Mumbai and IIT Mumbai scientists, contributing to their kidney research programs, setting up a sample biorepository, and planning their annual kidney conference. His division at Johns Hopkins also hosts medical students, residents, and nephrology fellows from leading academic institutions in India, further strengthening the global network of nephrology professionals and making you part of this interconnected community.

Dr. Parikh leads the Global Institute for Vision Equity (GIVE), an initiative that partners with high volume, social-justice driven eye care systems across India to enable equity in eye care globally through development and translation of novel solutions addressing critical needs in ophthalmology and designed for the patients, care providers, and the context of care in under-resourced settings.

I collaborate with colleagues in India such as those from the Aravind Eye Institute in India to develop better methods for identifying individuals at higher risk for future blindness (so that they may be caught and treated early). We have also run clinical trials to improve treatment algorithms for patients with routine and complex eye conditions.

Creating a bidirectional pipeline for training in the basic biomedical sciences between India and USA, sharing best practices in PhD education including mentor training, rigor and reproducibility, career preparation, design and development of masters and doctoral level coursework in basic biomedical sciences.

My work focuses on antibiotic stewardship, infection control, and detection to combat antimicrobial resistance India. We have been supported by the CDC to study Gram-negative bloodstream infection in several neonatal intensive care units in Pune and look forward to new opportunities to study antimicrobial resistance in larger networks. We have also studied how diagnosis of acute febrile illness impacts antibiotic use.

I am interested in metabolic diseases and molecular imaging and application of AI in endocrine disease. I have had collaborations with Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai.

Gastroenterologist Florin Selaru has faculty appointments to the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology; the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center; and the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Institute of NanoBioTechnology at The Johns Hopkins University. He is a clinical expert in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and serves as the director of the Harvey M. and Lyn P. Meyerhoff Inflammatory Bowel Disease Center at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Selaru earned his medical degree at Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, Romania. He completed his internal medicine residency at University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore and completed his fellowship training in gastroenterology and hepatology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

I'm interested in understanding human factors influencing human bacterial microbiome (bacterial genes within us) influencing human health. My research focuses on blood microbiome (bacterial DNA in blood) and its relationship to chronic diseases, special focus on kidney diseases. Studies show that diverse and balanced bacterial community promotes health while loss of diversity and imbalanced community associates with diseases. I am interested in Indian and western microbiome comparisons.

I have primarily lectured on topics primarily in pancreaticobiliary disease and/or performed live endoscopy demonstrations at gastroenterology conferences in India since 2011. I have also taken part in hospital ward rounds with medical students, residents and fellows. I have also been the PI of a randomized controlled trial on post-ERCP pancreatitis prophylaxis which had 3 participating centers in India. This was published in 2019 and represents one of the largest prophylaxis trials ever conducted. We are about to start another such trial in 2022.

Dr. Solomon's work focuses on HIV, viral hepatitis and other infectious diseases across India. He currently has operations in almost 20 Indian states and partners with national and state governments as well as community-based organizations.

As an Indian born, US trained adult hip & knee reconstruction surgeon, I have the unique privilege of sharing orthopedic knowledge and skills with my peers in India. My work is focussed on advances in digital health, robotic-assisted surgery, optimizing patient outcomes and surgical techniques surrounding complex joint reconstructions. I also provide fellowship opportunities for international applicants to visit Johns Hopkins.

My laboratory focuses on chronic hepatitis B and HIV-hepatitis B co-infection including translational research aimed at curing hepatitis B. I also have active research projects involving hepatitis C and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

Dr. Thomas' research interests are in hepatitis viruses - their epidemiology and pathogenesis as well as our elimination efforts. He also has a long-standing interest in capacity development around research and training in infectious diseases.

Jeffrey A Tornheim, MD, MPH is an Assistant Professor in the Divisions of Infectious Diseases and Pediatric Hospital Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He received his medical degree from the Mount Sinai University School of Medicine, completed a combined residency in Internal Medicine and Pediatrics at Yale New Haven Hospital and a clinical fellowship in Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. His research combines cohort epidemiology and diagnostic tools to personalize therapy for drug-resistant tuberculosis. His projects have applied combinations of clinical data with expanded phenotypic drug susceptibility testing, minimum inhibitory concentration testing, next generation sequencing of both the Mycobacterial genome and the human transcriptome, therapeutic drug monitoring, and novel biomarker assessments to improve treatment outcomes for drug resistant tuberculosis.

Dr. Bharath Ambale-Venkatesh has been fascinated by the use of imaging to probe the human body ever since he read about the discovery of functional MRI in the early 90s while still in middle school. He earned his BS from BMS College of Engineering, India, in 2004 and PhD from Auburn University, Alabama, in 2010, with his dissertation focused on understanding myocardial mechanics from cardiac MRI. Bharath then moved to Johns Hopkins University to diversify his research portfolio. Now a faculty member in the department of Radiology, he continues research in cardiovascular imaging, epidemiology, and data science.