Meet the JCI Editorial Board

Rexford S. Ahima, MD, PhD


Rexford Ahima is Director of the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism; Professor of Medicine, Public Health, and Nursing; and Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Diabetes at Johns Hopkins University. His research focuses on central and peripheral actions of adipocyte hormones in energy homeostasis, and glucose and lipid metabolism. Dr. Ahima is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and the Association of American Physicians, as well as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Mark E. Anderson, MD, PhD


Mark Anderson is William Osler Professor of Medicine and Director of the Department of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University and Physician-in-Chief of the Johns Hopkins Hospital. Dr. Anderson’s research is focused on cellular signaling and ionic mechanisms that cause heart failure and sudden cardiac death, and defining the role of calmodulin kinase II (CaMKII) regulation in heart failure and arrhythmias. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), the Association of American Physicians, the American Clinical and Climatological Association, and the Fondation Leducq Scientific Advisory Committee.

Mary Y. Armanios, MD


Mary Armanios is a Professor in the Department of Oncology and the McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Armanios’s research interests have focused on understanding the role of telomeres and telomerase in disease, and she currently follows one of the largest cohorts of patients with telomere-mediated disease. Dr. Armanios is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Nilofer S. Azad, MD


Nilofer Azad is an Associate Professor of Oncology and a member of the Gastrointestinal Oncology Program within the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Azad is the PI of numerous early-phase clinical trials in solid tumors and gastrointestinal cancers. She is a member of the NCI Colon Cancer Task Force, the Advisory Board of the Biden Cancer Initiative, and the Executive Board of the Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation. Her laboratory is currently investigating drugs that work through epigenetic mechanisms, as well as epigenetic molecular differences in tumors that may change the efficacy of treatment, as well as the intersection of these agents with immunotherapy.

William R. Bishai, MD, PhD


William Bishai is Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Co-Director of the Center for TB Research at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. His main areas of research include TB mechanisms of pathogenesis and development of tools to combat TB, including drugs, diagnostics, and vaccines. Dr. Bishai is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and the Association of American Physicians.

Joel N. Blankson, MD, PhD

Joel Blankson is Professor of Medicine and Molecular and Comparative Pathobiology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Blankson’s research focuses on viral reservoirs, T cell–mediated control of viral replication in the natural control of HIV-1 infection, and strategies for eliciting functional and sterilizing cures of HIV-1 infection. Dr. Blankson is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Robert A. Brodsky, MD


Robert Brodsky is the Johns Hopkins Family Professor of Medicine and Oncology, and Director of the Division of Adult Hematology, and directs the Johns Hopkins Hematology Fellowship program. Dr. Brodsky has a broad background in hematopoiesis, bone marrow failure, and complement biology, and his laboratory studies the biology and genetics of PIGA mutations and has developed a diagnostic reagent (FLAER) for and drug (eculizumab) to treat paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria.

Peter A. Calabresi, MD


Peter Calabresi is a Professor of Neurology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Director of the Johns Hopkins Multiple Sclerosis Center. Dr. Calabresi is also Director of the Division of Neuroimmunology and Neuroinfectious Diseases. He has designed and directed several clinical trials investigating combination drug therapies in MS, and his specific laboratory research interest lies in understanding the mechanisms of T lymphocyte differentiation into effector memory T cells and how these T cells interface with glial cells in the brain to modulate remyelination. Dr. Calabresi is a member of the Association of American Physicians.

Arturo Casadevall, MD, PhD


Arturo Casadevall is Chair and Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Johns Hopkins University and the Bloomberg Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Casadevall works on the problem of microbial pathogenesis, with a focus on the human pathogenic fungus Cryptococcus neoformans, a frequent cause of disease in immunocompromised individuals, as well as studying Bacillus anthracis and Mycobacterium tuberculosis. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), and the Association of American Physicians, and the National Academy of Medicine.

Thomas L. Clemens, PhD


Thomas Clemens is a Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at Johns Hopkins University. His research is focused on identification of the cellular and molecular mechanisms that control skeletal development and repair. He is the past Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research and has served as an advisory editor to Bone Research and Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism.

Franco R. D’Alessio, MD


Franco D’Alessio is Assistant Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. D’Alessio’s research focuses on immunological determinants of acute lung inflammation and repair, regulatory T cells in lung injury and repair, modulation of alveolar macrophage innate immune response in acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), and age-dependent lung immune responses in acute lung injury and ARDS.

Ted M. Dawson, MD, PhD


Ted Dawson is the Leonard and Madlyn Abramson Professor in Neurodegenerative Diseases and Director of the Institute for Cell Engineering at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Dawson is also Director of the NINDS Morris K. Udall Parkinson’s Disease Research Center of Excellence. His laboratory is interested in the molecular mechanisms by which neurons die in neurologic and neurodegenerative diseases. Dr. Dawson is a member of the Association of American Physicians and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Angelo M. De Marzo, MD, PhD


Angelo De Marzo is Associate Director of Cancer Research Pathology at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Professor of Pathology, Oncology, and Urology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. De Marzo’s research interests include the molecular pathobiology of prostate cancer, biospecimen banking, biomarker development, and tissue microarrays. He has served on the editorial boards of the The Prostate and Cancer Prevention Research.

Stephen V. Desiderio, MD, PhD


Stephen Desiderio is Professor of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Professor of Medicine, and Director of the Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Desiderio studies the molecular mechanisms that govern immune development and function, with a particular focus on V(D)J recombination and its role in immunity. Dr. Desiderio is a member of the Henry Kunkel Society, the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), and the Association of American Physicians.

Mark Donowitz, MD


Mark Donowitz is Professor in and Director of the Hopkins Center for Epithelial Disorders, and Director of the Hopkins NIH Conte Digestive Diseases Basic and Translational Research Core Center. Dr. Donowitz’s focus is understanding regulation of intestinal Na absorption in normal digestive physiology and abnormalities that contribute to diarrheal diseases. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), the Association of American Physicians, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Andrew P. Feinberg, MD, MPH


Andrew Feinberg is King Fahd Professor of Medicine, Oncology, Molecular Biology & Genetics at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. His work includes the discovery of human imprinted genes, loss of imprinting (LOI) in cancer, and the molecular basis of Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome, the paradigm of epigenetic cancer syndromes. Dr. Feinberg is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), Association of American Physicians, National Academy of Medicine, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Paul M. Hassoun, MD


Paul Hassoun is Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Director of the Pulmonary Hypertension Program at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Dr. Hassoun leads a large clinical program dedicated to the diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and several programmatic efforts in clinical and basic PAH research. His research interests include acute lung injury and regulation, the role of xanthine oxidase in lung injury, and molecular determinants of pulmonary hypertension.

Maureen R. Horton, MD


Maureen Horton is Professor of Medicine in the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and co-Director of the Johns Hopkins Interstitial Lung Disease Clinic. Her research focuses on deciphering the immunologic mechanisms that promote lung inflammation and fibrosis, including defining the role of the extracellular matrix and aberrant cellular processes in driving lung inflammation, as well as examining the ability of immunotherapy and immunometabolic therapy to reverse lung inflammation and fibrosis. Dr. Horton is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Elizabeth M. Jaffee, MD


Elizabeth Jaffee is the Dana and Albert “Cubby” Broccoli Professor of Oncology, Co-Director of Gastrointestinal Cancer Programs, and Deputy Director of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Jaffee specializes in cancer immunology, with specific expertise in the preclinical and early clinical development of immunotherapies for breast and pancreatic cancers. She is member of the Association of American Physicians.

Mariana J. Kaplan, MD


Mariana Kaplan is a Senior Investigator and Chief of the Systemic Autoimmunity Branch as well as Deputy Scientific Director of the Intramural Research Program at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases, NIH. Her research focuses on characterizing the role of the innate immune system in the development of systemic rheumatic diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus and rheumatoid arthritis. Dr. Kaplan also investigates mechanisms of vascular damage in autoimmunity. She is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and the Association of American Physicians.

Marikki Laiho, MD, PhD


Marikki Laiho is the Willard and Lillian Hackerman Professor of Radiation Oncology, professor in Radiation Oncology and Oncology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and director of the Molecular Radiation Sciences research division in the Department of Radiation Oncology. Her research focuses on DNA damage biology and in developing new therapeutic agents targeting cellular transcriptional programs altered in cancer. She serves on the editorial board of The Prostate.

Leo Luznik, MD


Leo Luznik is associate professor in the Department of Oncology, Hematologic Malignancies, at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His research focuses on understanding basic mechanisms of allogeneic immune response, with the overarching goal of improving the clinical application of allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation. Dr. Luznik is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Marcela V. Maus, MD, PhD


Dr. Maus is Director of Cellular Immunotherapy at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Cancer Center; a member of the Center for Cancer Immunology and the Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology and Oncology, at MGH; Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School; and Associate Member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. Her research focuses on the generation, mechanism, and use of innovative forms of T cell engineering, including chimeric antigen receptors, and bringing these cell therapies to the clinical setting to treat patients with cancer.

Timothy H. Moran, PhD


Timothy Moran is the Paul R. McHugh Professor of Motivated Behaviors, and Vice Chair and Director of Research in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is also Director of Behavioral and Biological Research in the Johns Hopkins Global Center for Obesity Prevention at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, where he has a joint appointment as Professor of International Health. Dr. Moran’s research interests are in brain/behavior relationships as they apply to the control of food intake and body weight, focusing on brain/gut peptides as feedback controls of meal size, how these interact with neural systems involved in overall energy balance and reward processing, and how these may go awry in eating disorders and obesity. Dr. Moran is a Council member of the Obesity Society, past president of the Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior, and chair of the NIH Integrative Physiology of Obesity and Diabetes Study Section.

Laszlo Nagy, MD, PhD


Laszlo Nagy is Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University and Associate Director of the Center for Metabolic Origins of Disease at Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida. Dr. Nagy is studying the role of nuclear hormone receptors in determining cell type specificity and activity by connecting whole body and cellular metabolism to the expression of the genome and the function of the epigenome. His work has ramifications for diseases and processes such as atherosclerosis, diabetes, chronic inflammation, and tissue regeneration. Dr. Nagy is member of the Henry Kunkel Society, the European Molecular Biology Organization, and Academia Europaea.

William Nelson, MD, PhD


William Nelson is the Marion I. Knott Professor of Oncology and Director of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University. He holds Professorships in oncology, medicine, pharmacology, pathology, radiation oncology, urology, and environmental health sciences. Dr. Nelson has elucidated mechanisms of prostate cancer development, leading to the creation of strategies for prostate cancer diagnosis, detection, treatment, and prevention. He has been Executive Editor of Cancer Today and Senior Editor of Cancer Research. Dr. Nelson is a member of the Association of American Physicians.

Brian O’Rourke, PhD


Brian O’Rourke is a Professor in the Division of Cardiology and Vice Chair for Basic and Translational Research for the Department of Medicine of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. O’Rourke directs the Bernard Laboratory of Fundamental Research in Preventive Cardiology and is an adjunct faculty member in the Institute for Computational Medicine, the NIDDK Hopkins Digestive Diseases Basic Research Development Center, and the Cellular and Molecular Medicine Graduate Training Program. His research team studies the biophysics, energetics, and physiology of cardiac cells and hearts in normal and diseased states utilizing a range of molecular, electrophysiological, gene transfer, imaging, and computational techniques spanning from the structure and function of single proteins to the behavior of intact hearts and animals.

Ben Ho Park, MD, PhD


Ben Ho Park is Professor of Medicine and Director of Precision Oncology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Dr. Park’s work focuses on developing new therapeutics and diagnostics for breast cancer using genetics-based approaches and has pioneered the use of “liquid biopsies" for breast cancer therapy. Dr. Park is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile)

Jonathan D. Powell, MD, PhD


Jonathan Powell is Professor of Oncology, Pharmacology, and Molecular Sciences and Associate Director of the Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Dr. Powell’s laboratory studies the cellular, biochemical, and molecular mechanisms surrounding T cell activation, differentiation, and tolerance and has provided insight into devising regimens for immunotherapy for cancer, bone marrow transplantation, autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, and type 2 diabetes. Dr. Powell is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Thomas C. Quinn, MD


Thomas Quinn is Distinguished Investigator and Head of the Section on International HIV/AIDS Research in the Laboratory of Immunoregulation at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, where he is also Associate Director for International Research for the Division of Intramural Research. Dr. Quinn is Professor of Medicine and Pathology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Professor of International Health, Epidemiology, and Immunology and Molecular Microbiology in the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, as well as founding Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Global Health. His research interests involve laboratory and field investigations that have helped define the biological factors involved in sexual and perinatal transmission of HIV, the natural history and treatment of HIV infections, and the molecular epidemiology of HIV. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine, the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), and the Association of American Physician and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Hamid Rabb, MD


Hamid Rabb is Professor of Medicine and Surgery, and Medical Director of Kidney Transplantation at Johns Hopkins University. His research is on the role of immune cells in acute kidney injury and repair. Dr. Rabb is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and Association of American Physicians, and has served as Vice Chair for Research, Johns Hopkins Department of Medicine, as well as medical service chief for the Johns Hopkins combined transplant unit.

Jean-Pierre Raufman, MD


Jean-Pierre Raufman is the Moses and Helen Golden Paulson Professor of Medicine and Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, and Head of the Division of Gastroenterology & Hepatology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He also serves as Director of a T32 Program in Gastroenterology Research. Dr. Raufman’s research interest is signal transduction in the gastrointestinal tract, with a focus on the role of muscarinic receptors and ligands in colon neoplasia. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Stuart C. Ray, MD


Stuart Ray is Professor of Medicine, Oncology, and Health Sciences Informatics and Vice Chair of Medicine for Data Integrity and Analytics at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He also directs the Johns Hopkins Laboratory for Integrated NanoDiagnostics Dr. Ray’s research focuses on the evolution of RNA viruses, primarily hepatitis C virus (HCV) and HIV, and the ways in which viral evolution in vivo serves as a biological probe for the host-pathogen relationship. He is a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation (profile).

Linda Smith Resar, MD


Linda Resar is a Professor in the Departments of Medicine, Oncology, and Pathology, and member of the Institute for Cellular Engineering at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She directs a laboratory that studies high-mobility group A (HMGA) chromatin remodeling proteins in cancer and development. Dr. Resar also focuses on developing approaches to target HMGA1 in cancer and harness its activity for regenerative medicine. She serves on the editorial board of the American Journal of Hematology.

Jeffrey D. Rothstein, MD, PhD


Jeffrey Rothstein is the John Griffin Director of the Brain Science Institute and Professor of Neurology and Neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University. He is the Founder and Director of the Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Rothstein’s laboratory research interests range from the basic neurobiology of CNS glia and their role in regulating neurotransmission to the pathophysiology of neurodegenerative disease, focusing on ALS. He is a member of the Association of American Physicians.

Jonathan Schneck, MD, PhD


Jonathan Schneck is Professor of Pathology, Medicine, and Oncology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He is also a Co-Founder of the biotech company NexImmune. His work has focused on understanding and manipulating T cell responses and related technology development, and he has developed products including the soluble multivalent MHC complex MHC-Ig and artificial antigen-presenting cells (aAPCs).

Gregg L. Semenza, MD, PhD


Gregg Semenza is an American Cancer Society Research Professor and the C. Michael Armstrong Professor at Johns Hopkins University, with appointments in Genetic Medicine, Pediatrics, Medicine, Oncology, Radiation Oncology, and Biological Chemistry; he is also founding Director of the Vascular Program in the Johns Hopkins Institute for Cell Engineering. Dr. Semenza’s laboratory discovered hypoxia-inducible factor 1 (HIF-1), a master regulator that directs responses to decreased oxygen availability, and his lab has shown that HIF-1 plays important roles in cardiovascular disorders, cancer, COPD, diabetes, sleep apnea, transplant rejection, and hematologic disorders. He is a member of the Society for Pediatric Research, American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile), Association of American Physicians, National Academy of Medicine, and National Academy of Sciences.

Akrit S. Sodhi, MD, PhD


Akrit Sodhi is an associate professor of ophthalmology at the Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute. Dr. Sodhi’s research interests center on the role of the transcription factor hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF) in ocular disease. His laboratory investigates the role of HIF and HIF-regulated gene products in the pathophysiology of ischemic retinopathies, retinal degenerations, and ocular tumors, with the goal of identifying novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets for the diagnosis, prevention and/or treatment of these vision-threatening diseases.

Charlotte Sumner, MD


Charlotte Sumner is a Professor of Neurology and Neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Sumner’s research focuses on the genetic and cellular pathogenesis of spinal muscular atrophies, with particular attention to identification of disease genes, characterization of molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying disease pathogenesis, and preclinical development of therapeutics. She is the coeditor of the only comprehensive book on SMA: Spinal Muscular Atrophy Disease Mechanisms and Therapy. Dr. Sumner is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile)

Simeon I. Taylor, MD, PhD

Simeon Taylor is Professor of Medicine in the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Nutrition at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He also serves as Director of the NIDDK-supported Mid-Atlantic Nutrition Obesity Research Center, as well as the T32 Institutional Training Program in Diabetes. Dr. Taylor’s current research relates to precision medicine and the pharmacogenetics of diabetes drugs; (b) clinical safety of diabetes drugs; and (c) genetics of cardiometabolic disease. He is a member of the American Society for Clincial Investigation (profile) and the Association of American Physicians.

Gordon F. Tomaselli, MD


Gordon Tomaselli is the Marilyn and Stanley M. Katz Dean at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He is an expert in the fields of sudden cardiac death and arrhythmias, with research focused on ion channel structure, function, and remodeling. Dr. Tomaselli is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile) and the Association of American Physicians.

Robert G. Weiss, MD


Robert Weiss is Clarence Doodeman Professor of Cardiology, as well as a Professor of Medicine and Radiology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Weiss’s research interests include the energetic consequences and causes of heart failure, predictors of sudden cardiac death, noninvasive magnetic resonance, the role of creatine kinase in heart failure, spectroscopy and imaging, coronary endothelial function, and small animal cardiovascular imaging. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (profile).

Sarah J. Wheelan, MD, PhD


Sarah Wheelan is an associate professor of oncology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and associate professor of biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is co-director of the Experimental and Computational Genomics Core in the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Wheelan’s laboratory studies retrotransposons in cancer, pathogenesis of prostate cancer, and chromatin architecture.

Marsha Wills-Karp, PhD


Marsha Wills-Karp is the Anna M. Baetjer Professor and Chair of the Department of Environmental Health and Engineering at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her work is focused on understanding the immunogenic basis of allergic diseases including asthma. She has served as the Deputy Editor of Mucosal Immunology and is a member of the Society of Mucosal Immunology, the American Association of Immunologists, and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.
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