Newswise — NEWARK, N.J. – Amariliz Rivera, PhD, an immunology researcher at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-New Jersey Medical School (NJMS), has received a $60,000 grant from the Feldstein Medical Foundation to study how the body’s immune system reacts to fungal infections of the lung. Specifically, Rivera will examine the mechanisms by which monocytes and monocyte-derived dendritic cells, which are immune system components, respond to, and work to reduce, infection.
Rivera, an assistant professor in the interdepartmental Center for Immunity and Inflammation and the Department of Pediatrics at NJMS, notes that fungal infection has not received nearly the attention in scientific research that viral and bacterial infections have drawn. Especially in patients whose immune systems are compromised either through diseases such as HIV/AIDS or as side effects of medical treatments such as chemotherapy, she notes that fungal pathogens are increasingly recognized as a cause of disease and death in locations around the world. Her goal in her newly-funded work is to use advancing knowledge of the body’s reaction to fungal infections as a foundation for developing new therapies that harness the immune system to control those infections.
William C. Gause, PhD, Senior Associate Dean for Research and Director of the Center for Immunity and Inflammation at NJMS, says it is a matter of great pride for the school that the Feldstein Medical Foundation has chosen to fund Rivera’s work. “The Feldstein Medical Foundation makes a point of identifying projects where great promise exists but other sources of funding are hard to come by,” says Gause. “By singling out the work of Dr. Rivera for funding, the Foundation has made a profound statement about the quality and potential benefits of this research.”
About UMDNJ:The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) is New Jersey’s only health sciences university with more than 6,000 students on five campuses attending three medical schools, the State’s only dental school, a graduate school of biomedical sciences, a school of health related professions, a school of nursing and New Jersey’s only school of public health. UMDNJ operates University Hospital, a Level I Trauma Center in Newark, and University Behavioral HealthCare, which provides a continuum of healthcare services with multiple locations throughout the State.
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