Michel Nussenzweig - F1000 Section Head (since 13 July 2001)
Laboratory of Molecular Immunology, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY, USA
BIOGRAPHY
ACADEMIC POSITIONS:• Sherman Fairchild Professor, Laboratory of Molecular Immunology
• Investigator, HHMI
EDUCATION:
Dr Nussenzweig received his bachelor’s degree from New York University in 1975. He received his PhD in 1981 from Rockefeller University, where he studied under Ralph M Steinman, and his MD in 1982 from New York University School of Medicine. He continued his clinical training at Massachusetts General Hospital, first as an intern and resident in internal medicine from 1982 to 1985 and then as a clinical fellow in infectious diseases from 1984 to 1985. In 1986 he began his postdoctoral research in genetics at Harvard Medical School.
HONORS AND AWARDS:
Dr Nussenzweig was elected to the Institute of Medicine in 2009 and received the Lee C Howley Sr Prize for Arthritis Research in 2008, the American Association of Immunologists-Huang Foundation Meritorious Career Award in 2004 and the Solomon A Berson Alumni Achievement Award for Basic Science from New York University in 2003. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
RESEARCH INTERESTS:
Dr Nussenzweig combines a variety of techniques from biochemistry and molecular biology with gene targeting and transgenic technologies to get an atomic-level look at the workings of the immune system. His research on adaptive immunity – the part of the system that adapts to new pathogens and primes the body against future encounters with them – focuses on B lymphocytes and antibodies; his work on innate immunity – which defends the body against all pathogens generically – focuses on dendritic cells, the sentinels of the immune system. Nussenzweig has provided important insights into how autoimmune diseases develop and has developed methods that target specific antigens to dendritic cells, which may lead to both vaccines against pathogens and treatments for autoimmunity.