VFCE Members

Rachel Abraham is a current DrPH candidate and serves as the Evaluation Manager at Campus Health Service. Her research aims to explore willingness of individuals to vaccinate and study how perceived risk impacts future vaccination. Additionally, Ms. Abraham's aims to study the economic impact of Valley fever within the state of Arizona.   

As an academic biostatistician, I collaborate with researchers in a variety of disciplines, including the clinicians and scientists at the Valley Fever Center for Excellence.  I have provided study design and biostatistical analysis support on projects ranging from vaccine development to the assessment and development of prediction models from clinical data.

We are conducting research to characterize the physical, chemical, and biological properties of soils that tend to harbor Coccidioides.

As both a practicing physician and a research scientist, Dr. Donovan has long cultivated a particular interest in medical mycology. Her research focuses on the identification of virulence factors and the interaction of several fungi with the human host. She conducted studies in Coccidioides with goals to help in the earlier diagnosis of Valley fever to improve patient outcomes, lower costs and heighten antibiotic stewardship. Additionally, she is developing plans to study the host innate immune response to Coccidioides with a focus on the early events in coccidioidomycosis.

The Frelinger lab has been interested for some years in immune responses to the lung pathogens, influenza virus and Francisella tularensis. They have begun collaborations on the role of T cell responses in Coccidioides infections and the development of an effective vaccine.

The Johnson laboratory focuses on how microbes react to metal stress. He hopes to exploit microbial systems to make better treatments in bacterial and fungal systems. Dr. Johnson collaborates with the Galgiani laboratory as a protein biochemist to make new formulations of the CTS1 protein for diagnostics and understanding immunity. 

My research focuses on machine learning and applied natural language processing. I believe that clinical notes contain information relevant to earlier diagnosis of VF.

Dr. Mandel's research focuses on defining mechanisms of the pathogenicity in Coccidioides by using molecular genetic methods and gene expression studies to understand the transition from the saprobic to the parasitic growth phase. She has developed tools for efficiently disrupt Coccidioides genes.  She has been instrumental in work defining the role of CPS1, the gene that was deleted in the Valley fever live-attenuated vaccine, in Coccidioides. 

Dr. Orbach is a fungal geneticist and molecular biologist in the School of Plant Sciences at the University of Arizona. His laboratory studies the mechanisms of virulence of fungal plant and animal pathogens, with a focus on Coccidioides. His work studying Coccidioides virulence factors led to the discovery and development of the delta-cps1 vaccine against Coccidioidomycosis.

I am currently working on a retrospective observational study pertaining to Coccidiodomycosis of the spine over a 10-year study period. I am also working on a case series pertaining to Coccidiodomycosis of the lower extremity in southern Arizona.
 

Dr. Shubitz is a Research Scientist at The Valley Fever Center for Excellence. Her research focus includes developing a vaccine for Valley fever, studying the epidemiology of the disease in canines, the ecological distribution of the fungus in Southern Arizona and interactions between the host (both animal and human) and the fungus that causes Valley fever, using animal models.

My group investigates how a key virulence related protein in the fungal pathogen that causes Valley fever, CPS1, functions during its life cycle. The CPS1 protein is important because it can be knocked out to create a strain of the organism that is not virulent and may make a suitable vaccine candidate.  We use a high-powered imaging technique, cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), to proved near atomic level images of the CPS1 protein to understand how it recognizes and acts on its substrate. We combine cryo-EM with with biochemical assays and light microscopy to gain an understanding of CPS1 activity.