DONALD ALCENDOR, PHD, LAB STARTUP PACKAGE: KSHV AND CMV IN HIV

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This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. Before HAART in 1996, at a height of HIV/AIDS epidemic, the incidence of Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) increased 20,000 fold among homosexual males in the United States and KS is now the predominant HIV/AIDS related malignancy in Southern Africa. Antiretroviral therapy has reduced the incidence of KS in western countries however 99% of the estimated 40 to 60 million people infected with HIV have no access to these drugs and KS remains to be a problem worldwide. My research interest involves understanding mechanisms involved in KSHV disregulation of endothelial cell adhesion molecules which has implications for immune pathogenesis and tumorigenesis. Primary cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection in women during pregnancy can lead to life threatening neonatal disease and CMV infection in immunocompromised groups such transplant patients and individuals infected with HIV that are predisposed to severe morbidity and mortality associated with CMV. I have additional interest in cytomegalovirus dissemination in the brain of both congenital infected neonates as well CMV/HIV coinfections in the brain of AIDS patients. We are developing an infection model for both CMV and HIV in primary human brain microvascular endothelial cells to better understand CNS disease observed in these patients.