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The mission of the Center for Infectious Disease Research (CIDR), is to enhance research efforts that focus on understanding the molecular mechanisms of pathogenesis related to infection with all types of microorganisms, viruses, fungi or parasites. These efforts also include programs to define host factors contributing to disease resistance or susceptibility, host recognition of foreign materials and the innate and adaptive immune responses following exposure to infectious organisms. Overall, the long-term goals are to integrate basic and translational research for the development of new therapeutics, vaccines and diagnostic tests. CIDR also manages the BSL3/ABSL3 laboratory containment core and the Select Agent Research Program at MCW.
Project areas include the study of botulinum toxin, HIV/HTLV pathogenesis and drug abuse, mechanisms of epithelial barrier maintenance and repair, cytokine and chemokine modulation of the intestinal mucosa, opportunistic infections, the emergence of multidrug resistant bacteria, antibody therapeutics, gene regulation of bacterial pathogens, the generation and decay of memory T cells, diagnostics for category A agents and pandemic influenza, drug discovery for unique parasitic aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases, characterization of antimicrobial defensins, the role of endogenous microbiota in human health and disease, Vaccinia virus replication and assembly, autophagy and its relationship to viral egress, cutaneous infections and the mechanisms of replication and latency of intracellular pathogens.
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Center Information
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Center Director
Dara W. Frank, PhD
Professor, Microbiology and Molecular Genetics
Director, Center for Infectious Disease Research
Administration
Catherine Kienast
Financial Analyst
Phone (414) 955-4924 Fax (414) 955-6567
ckienast@mcw.edu
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