Ragon Institute
Mar 5, 2024 Features
Ragon faculty member Hernandez Moura Silva, PhD, was recently awarded the MIT 2024 Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Award for faculty. MLK Leadership Awards are given annually to students, alumni, staff, groups, and faculty members who embody the spirit of Dr. King’s work. “Service to the community” is defined in the broadest sense and includes […]
Feb 29, 2024 Features
Ragon faculty Mathias Lichterfeld, MD, PhD, and Xu Yu, MD, have co-authored a paper published in Cell which found evidence that a combination of two drugs increases the vulnerability of HIV-1 reservoir cells to the immune system — which shows promising results in targeting and reducing the HIV-1 reservoir in people living with HIV. Using […]
Feb 5, 2024 Features
Novel HIV vaccine candidate based on Gorilla adenoviral vector (GRAd-HIV) funded by The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to alleviate the disease burden and improve the lives of the millions who lack access to prevention options ReiThera Srl, the Ragon Institute of Mass General, MIT, and Harvard, and IAVI are pleased to announce a collaboration […]
Jan 9, 2024 Features
Bats can be terrifying — from their fantastical association with vampires to their less fantastical, very real propensity for spreading rabies. These winged mammals have provoked fear in many people no matter how cute they are (to some!). But they might also be the key to solving some of the biggest mysteries in virology and […]
Dec 13, 2023 Features
Dr. Ghebremichael’s course provides a unique learning opportunity for students and a way to develop the field of biostatistics in their own communities Naledi Tapologo is a research assistant from Botswana with dreams of a long career in medical research. She said she thanked God when she saw an email in her inbox recently. That […]
Nov 27, 2023 Features
Last month, the Ragon was honored to welcome Azza Idris, MD, PhD, as our newest faculty member. She holds a dual appointment between the Ragon and the Pediatric Infectious Diseases and Global Health Divisions at Mass General for Children (MGfC). A renowned researcher in malaria, Dr. Idris has worked for institutions such as the NIH […]
Oct 27, 2023 Features
Both awards recognized his lifelong commitment to HIV research and his leadership in this field on the African continent Ragon associate member Thumbi Ndung’u, PhD, was recently awarded the 2023 Leadership Award in Public Health Practice by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health as well as the K.T. Jeang Retrovirology Prize from a […]
Sep 22, 2023 Features
The multinational research group collected samples to understand the immune systems of bats. High up in the mountains of Kenya are the lush Taita Hills — a vibrant and beautiful rainforest that seems entirely detached from the dry savannah common in the rest of the country. It is roughly halfway between the two largest cities […]
Sep 1, 2023 Features
With the launch of the Liu Lab today, the Ragon welcomes its newest Early Independence Fellow — Sophia Liu, PhD, and her team will spend the next five years building tools to study cell interactions in order to further our understanding of, and find ways to improve, the human immune system. The Institute is honored […]
Aug 14, 2023 Features
Botswana trial shows potential of bNAbs as a new avenue for treatment. Two faculty members from the Ragon Institute took part in a clinical trial in Botswana that found a potential alternative treatment to antiretroviral therapy for children with HIV — an important step in the fight to eliminate the virus. Mathias Lichterfeld, MD, PhD, […]
Aug 8, 2023 Features
The Ragon Institute is thrilled to announce the receipt of a generous gift from the Giuliani Foundation to establish the Giammaria and Sabrina Giuliani Endowed Faculty Support Fund — a permanent endowment that will support Ragon faculty who are pursuing research in human health and the immune system. The Giulianis’ exceptional contribution will fuel our […]
May 9, 2023 Features
Curiosity and community lie at the heart of this immunologist’s work. Ragon Institute faculty core member Hernandez Moura Silva has been named a Freeman Hrabowski Scholar by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). The new program supports early career scientists who are committed to creating diverse and inclusive lab environments for their students and training […]
Apr 19, 2023 Features
amfAR grantees Drs. Xu Yu and Mathias Lichterfeld discuss their differing approaches to curing HIV With a shared passion for science, this husband-wife team—he from Germany, she from China—are a prolific couple in the field of HIV cure research, regularly publishing in leading peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Xu Yu is an Associate Professor of Medicine at […]
Jan 4, 2023 Features
Media Contacts: Emily Makowski, 617-468-8970, [email protected] Serena Bronda, 857-869-7828, [email protected] Key Takeaways Researchers used a new single-cell proteogenomic profiling technique, PheP-Seq, to characterize surface markers of HIV reservoir cells from blood and lymph node samples from persons living with HIV They found specific biomarkers in these cells associated with resistance to elimination by human immune […]
Jan 2, 2023 Features
Media Contacts: Emily Makowski, 617-468-8970, [email protected] Serena Bronda, 857-869-7828, [email protected] Key Takeaways Researchers conducted a longitudinal analysis of HIV-1 reservoirs in people who have been on ART for approximately two decades. The findings suggest that long-term ART causes the immune system to select for latent HIV reservoirs that are in integrated in “block and lock” […]
Dec 5, 2022 Features
Article from The Nation featuring Dr. Thumbi Ndung’u and the Females Rising through Education, Support and Health (FRESH) program: thenation.com/article/world/prep-south-africa/