Co-Discoverer of the AIDS Virus and an Antibiotics Researcher to Speak at UH as part of the Distinguished Lecture Series

Jay and Stuart Levy present a joint public lecture on the challenges of microbes

Jay and Stuart Levy, identical twin brothers, will present a joint lecture at the University of Hawaii at Manoa's Campus Center Ballroom on February 26, 2003, at 7:30 p.m. Jay Levy's lecture is entitled "The Social and Economic Impact of HIV/AIDS: Can Science Find the Solution?" Stuart Levy will speak on "Antibiotic Resistance: Bacteria on the Defense." The lecture is free and open to the public.

Jay A. Levy, MD, an AIDS and cancer researcher and an educator at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine, is presently professor in the Department of Medicine and research associate in the Cancer Research Institute. He is head of the Laboratory of Tumor and AIDS Virus Research at UCSF where he established a laboratory for the study of tumor viruses. He was also a staff associate at the National Cancer Institute, where he conducted research on DNA and RNA cancer viruses.

During the last 18 years, Levy and his researchers have dedicated their efforts to the studies of AIDS. In 1983, he co-discovered the AIDS virus now called HIV. He pioneered heat treatment studies that demonstrated how to inactivate HIV in clotting factor preparations. This approach, for which he received the Murray Theilan Award from the National Hemophilia Foundation, has protected many hemophiliacs from HIV infection. He was the first to report the presence of HIV in the brain and linked it to neurological disease. His laboratory is currently pursuing approaches to use this response in therapy. Moreover, he is presently conducting studies directed at the development to an AIDS vaccine.

Levy is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and was given the Award of Distinction by the American Foundation for AIDS Research. He received the Distinguished Alumnus Award along with an honorary degree in science from Wesleyan University. In 1998, he was chosen by the San Francisco Examiner as one of the ten most influential people in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Levy is the Editor-in-Chief of the highly cited journal, AIDS. He has published over 400 scientific articles and reviews, and is the author and editor of 13 books dealing with viruses and immunology. Among these are his acclaimed four-volume series, "The Retroviridae," and his seminal, sole-authored book, "HIV and the Pathogenesis of AIDS," now in its second edition and translated into Chinese.

Levy graduated from Wesleyan University, and was awarded Fulbright and French Government fellowships to conduct research in Paris, France. He earned his MD in 1965 from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University and was an intern and resident at the University of Pennsylvania.

Stuart B. Levy, MD, is professor of Molecular Biology, Microbiology and Medicine, as well as the director of the Center for Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance at Tufts University School of Medicine. He is also Staff Physician at the New England Medical Center.

He was awarded the 1995 Hoechst-Roussel Award for esteemed research in anti-microbial chemotherapy by the American Society for Microbiology (ASM). In 1998, he was awarded an honorary degree in biology from Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. He was the 1998-1999 president of ASM. In 1992, he established and became director of the Center for Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance at Tufts University School of Medicine, where he conducts research in the areas of resistance to antibiotics and to anti-cancer drugs.

He has been featured and quoted for his work on antibiotic use and resistance in major national and international newspapers and magazines, and he has appeared on National Public Radio and all major American television network news shows, as well as on Canadian national television and Japanese public television. He was also featured in the March 28, 1994, Newsweek magazine cover story on antibiotic resistance and in the lead article on antibiotic resistance in Discover magazine in November 1998.

He is a graduate of Williams College in Wilmington, Delaware. He received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania and completed his residency at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York and postdoctoral research at the National Institutes of Health. He held research fellowships in Paris, Milan and Tokyo. Levy serves as President of the Alliance for the Prudent Use of Antibiotics, and is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians, the Infectious Disease Society of America, and the American Academy of Microbiology.

For more information, visit: http://www.hawaii.edu/dls