Santosh Kumar, PhD

Dr. Kumar is a Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences and an Assistant Dean in the College of Pharmacy at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. He is also President-elect of SNIP. Dr. Kumar laboratory works on HIV, COVID-19, drug abuse, cytochromes P450, and EVs. Dr. Kumar has been investigating the role of cellular and extracellular EVs/exosomal cytochrome P450 on alcohol- and smoking-induced HIV pathogenesis and neuronal damage, which subsequently cause HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders. His group is the first one to demonstrate the expression/packaging of cytochrome P450 enzymes in plasma EVs/exosomes. His group is also involved in developing EVs as biological carriers for small drugs and other agents to treat CNS disease including HIV in the brain.

Sowmya Yelamanchili, PhD

Dr. Yelamanchili is an Associate Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology at UNMC. She serves as the Interim Chair of the Diversity and Inclusion SNIP Committee. She also serves as an Executive Member for the Women’s Mentoring Committee at UNMC, where she has been involved in conducting community events focusing on diversity and tackling gender-bias in science and medicine. Dr. Yelamanchili’s research program focuses on understanding the role of EV and regulatory molecules such as genes, proteins, and microRNAs in the field of neuroAIDS and substance use disorder. Her laboratory has developed techniques to isolate tissue-derived EVs and she published extensively in the area of drugs of abuse.

Pankaj Seth, PhD

Dr. Seth is a Professor and Scientist VI at National Brain Research Centre, India. Dr. Seth’s research endeavor has been of direct relevance to national health problems — particularly HIV-1, drug abuse, Zika virus-mediated neuropathogenesis, and very recently effect of SARS-CoV2 on human brain. Dr. Seth was first to demonstrate that severity of HIV-1 dementia is associated with presence of dicysteine motif (C30C31) in HIV-1 Tat protein of HIV-1 subtype B. He showed that HIV-1 Tat subtype C (prevalent in India) lacks this dicysteine motif and is less neurotoxic to human neurons (Annals of Neurology 2008). Dr. Seth demonstrated HIV-1 Tat negatively impacts the properties of human neural stem cells (hNSCs) by affecting cell cycle regulator-cyclin D1 and expression profiles of genes important for proliferation and differentiation (J Neurovirology 2010). Later, he discovered the role of TRIM32, a stem cell fate determinant, in HIV-1-induced alteration of hNSCs proliferation and that TRIM32 is regulated by miR-155. He also established the role of miR-320a-VDAC1 axis in astrocyte-mediated neuronal damage in neuroAIDS. These findings were validated in human postmortem brain of AIDS patients from NIMHANS brain bank (Cell Death & Differentiation 2016; GLIA 2017). Further, Dr. Seth demonstrated Zika virus induces microcephaly in infants by altering miRNA circuitry and pinpointed role of two miRNAs (Cell Death & Differentiation 2018). Recently, he started research to understand why COVID19 patients exhibit neurological symptoms as brain fog. In fact, Dr. Seth had expressed this possibility in early stages of the global pandemic in April 2020 itself in a comprehensive review published by him, stating that SARS-CoV-2 is more than a respiratory virus (ACS Chem Neurosciences 2020), that is now accepted worldwide, in consonance with his vision and is being widely cited globally. With these capabilities and expertise Dr. Seth’s laboratory is geared up to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms as to how the SARS-CoV-2 affects the functioning of brain of COVID-19 patients. His research has been highlighted twice by Nature India and by the International Society of Neurovirology based in USA, electronic and print media, reflecting its impact in the field.

Jean M. Bidlack, PhD

Dr. Bidlack is a Professor of Pharmacology and Physiology at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry. Currently, she is Interim Secretary for SNIP and she is a past SNIP President. Dr. Bidlack works on studying drugs of abuse, particularly opioids. Using receptor binding, second messenger assays, and flow cytometry, Dr. Bidlack’s lab was the first to identify the presence of the kappa opioid receptor on certain cells from the immune system. The Bidlack lab works on identifying novel targets for treating opioid misuse. Additional current studies use BRET technology to understand bias opioid signaling among the multiple Gα subunits and opioid receptors.

Gurudutt N. Pendyala, PhD

Dr. Pendyala is a Robert Lieberman Professor of Anesthesiology in the Department of Anesthesiology at UNMC. The overarching focus in his lab focuses on how drugs of abuse alone and in conjunction with HIV exacerbate CNS dysfunction with emphasis on sex differences. Another arm of his research is understanding how prescription drug abuse during and after pregnancy impacts neurodevelopment in the exposed offspring, including outcomes on biopsychosocial factors in healthcare disparities during pregnancy. A common chord connecting these arms is the application of high throughput ‘omics’ strategies to identify potential biomarkers in both tissue and biofluids (plasma, CSF) including decoding their associated mechanisms in vitro. Dr. Pendyala’s administrative roles include serving as the Chairs of the Early Career Travel Award Committee in SNIP; Chair of the Grievance Committee in the Faculty Senate at UNMC and the founding member of the Child Health Research Institute affiliated with Children’s Hospital Omaha. Recently, Dr. Pendyala was recently elected Fellow of the National Strategic Research Institute, Department of Defense, UNMC Affiliate, and also as a standing member of its Fellows Program Advisory Council.

Sanjay B. Maggirwar, MBA, PhD

Dr. Maggirwar is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Microbiology, Immunology & Tropical Medicine at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. He also plays a leading role in the Center for AIDS Research of District of Columbia as a member of its Executive Committee and Co-Director of the Basic Science Core of this organization. Dr. Maggirwar has been a HIV/AIDS researcher for over twenty-five years. In recent years, his group has studied potential relationship between HIV-infection and platelets/monocytes activation in context to neuro-HIV, aging, thrombosis and atherosclerosis. In these studies, they have also explored how the interaction of platelets and HIV-infected leukocytes mobilize the leukocytes into the CNS during acute phase of infection, thereby facilitating the seeding of brain-resident viral reservoirs. Interestingly, they also found that the T cells, as well as astrocytes and pericytes, latently infected by HIV exhibit defective DNA repair mechanisms, directly implicating its role in the survival of these cells.

Sulie L. Chang, PhD

Originally, from Taiwan, Dr. Chang is Director of the Institute of NeuroImmune Pharmacology and Professor of Biological Sciences and Neuroscience at Seton Hall University. She is also an Adjunct Professor of Graduate Program in Endocrinology & Animal Biosciences, Rutgers Graduate School. Dr. Chang is the current President of SNIP. Dr. Chang has studied the bi-directional interactions between the nervous and immune systems in health and diseases. Her research goal is to address how systemic inflammation-induced modulation of the brain-immune axis leads to behavior disorders related to addiction, cognitive impairment, and other neuronal diseases. Recently, by taking comprehensive integration of in vivo, in vitro and in silico approaches, Dr. Chang’s research is to study neuroimmunology of health and diseases including spleen atrophy, alcohol abuse and drug addition, pain management, Alzheimer's disease, neuroHIV and neuroCOVID-19. Dr. Chang and her research teams have published over 145 scientific papers and book chapters with significant impact. Dr. Chang’s research has been continuously funded by NIH since 1989, and she has participated in numerous NIH Study Sections.