Florence Bourgeois
Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Children’s Tuberculosis Clinic
Roberta Lynn DeBiasi
Infectious Diseases, Children’s National Hospital
Thomas Diacovo
Pharmacology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Hatem El-Shanti
Medical Genetics and Genomics, University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine
Andrea T. Cruz, MD, MPH is a native Floridian and attended undergraduate at Harvard University and medical school at Vanderbilt University. Dr. Cruz completed her pediatrics residency and fellowships in pediatric emergency medicine and pediatric infectious diseases at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Cruz serves as the chief of research for pediatric emergency medicine and the director of the Children’s Tuberculosis Clinic. She is also the site PI for Texas Children’s Hospital for the Pediatric Emergency Care Applied Research Network (PECARN), the vice chair of the Pediatric Emergency Medicine Collaborative Research Committee, and an associate editor for Pediatrics. Dr. Cruz’s research interests include the diagnosis and treatment of latent tuberculosis infection and TB disease, rapid viral diagnostics, sepsis management, and differentiating viral from bacterial infections.
Andrea T. Cruz
Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Children’s Tuberculosis Clinic
Roberta Lynn DeBiasi, MD, MS is Chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Co-Director of the Congenital Zika Program and Co-Lead of the Ebola and Highly Contagious Infectious Disease institutional preparedness at Children’s National Hospital (CNH) in Washington DC. She holds appointments as tenured Professor of Pediatrics and Microbiology, Immunology and Tropical Medicine at George Washington University School of Medicine as well as Principal Investigator in the Center for Translational Research within Children’s Research Institute.
After graduating Phi Beta Kappa from Boston University, she received her Doctorate in Medicine at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, and completed internship and residency in Pediatrics at the University of California, Davis Medical Center. She completed her fellowship in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the University of Colorado/Denver Children’s Hospital and served on the faculty for ten years in Denver, prior to joining Children’s National/GWU in 2005.
Dr. DeBiasi treats normal and immunocompromised children hospitalized with severe infections at Children’s National Hospital. She is designated as a Top Doctor for Northern Virginia and by Washingtonian Magazine. Dr. DeBiasi’s research expertise includes basic science as well as clinical/translational research. She serves as Principal Investigator for research and multiple clinical trials focusing on severe and emerging viral infections. Research awards have included the Infectious Diseases Society of America Young Investigator Award, as well as the John Horsley Prize from UVA. She co-leads the CNHS Ebola and Emerging Infections Task Force, the Acute Flaccid Myelitis Task Force, and the CNHS Congenital Zika Program, interfacing with regional, national and international authorities in these roles. She evaluates and manages pregnant women and infants with Zika exposure and infection, and is performing Zika-focused research in the US and South America.
Dr. DeBiasi has authored over 80 original research, review articles, and book chapters. She greatly enjoys teaching and mentoring graduate and medical students, residents, and fellows in the classroom, the hospital wards, and in research. She is also actively engaged in continuing medical education for community physicians, outreach to the community, and educating the public via media appearances on NPR radio, local and national newspaper and television.
Roberta Lynn DeBiasi
Infectious Diseases, Children’s National Hospital
Dr. Thomas Diacovo is Professor of Pediatrics and Pharmacology at University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Chief of UPMC Division of Newborn Medicine, and Director of Neonatal Cardiovascular Research at the Heart Institute. He is also Professor Emeritus of Pediatrics at Columbia University School of Medicine. Dr. Diacovo attended McGill University, Montreal, Canada, where he obtained his BSc (Honors Biochemistry) and MD. He conducted his medical internship/residency at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, and completed clinical/research fellowships at Harvard University, Boston, MA. Dr. Diacovo received multiple awards for his scientific achievements including the Kenneth M. Brinkhous Young Investigator Prize in Thrombosis (AHA), Lewis Katz Prize in Cardiovascular Medicine for outstanding basic science research in cardiovascular medicine (Columbia University), NYS Foundation for Science, Technology and Innovation Award (NYSTAR), and Columbia–Coulter Translational Research Partnership Program Award. In addition, he has been asked to serve on several local, national, and international committees that involve improving healthcare for critically-ill neonates.
Dr. Diacovo’s research endeavors stem from his clinical interest in hemostasis and thrombosis, and in particular, understanding and preventing thrombotic events in neonates undergoing complex cardiac repair for cyanotic heart lesions. This involves the interrogation of key adhesion and signaling pathways in platelets from pre- and post-operative neonatal cardiac patients using low volume microfluidic technologies, state-of-the-art genetic and bioenergetic approaches, and a proprietary animal model that permits the in vivo study of human platelet mediated hemostasis and thrombosis. His group has recently completed a successful phase I-II PK /PD and safety study on a novel drug for use in the prevention of shunt thrombosis in neonates requiring palliation with a systemic-to-pulmonary artery shunt. Plans are underway for a phase 3 national/international trial.
Another focus of Dr. Diacovo’s laboratory is elucidating the role that class I PI3Ks play in innate and adaptive immune responses. His group discovered that it is possible to protect against and reduce the extent of tissue injury associated with an acute inflammatory response by selectively targeting the PI3K isoforms gamma and delta. He also made the seminal observation that (i) PI3Kgamma and PI3Kdelta can function as non-classical oncogenes, supporting the development and survival of T cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL), and (ii) that it is feasible to therapeutically exploit the requirement of this leukemia to these PI3K isoforms, enabling the rational design of a PI3K gamma/delta dual inhibitor for use in the treatment of childhood leukemia. Work is currently focused on further characterization of a novel dual PI3K gamma/delta inhibitor developed while he was at Columbia University, as well as understanding potential mechanisms of drug resistance.
Thomas Diacovo
Pharmacology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Hatem El-Shanti, MD, is the Director of the Division of Medical Genetics and Genomics in the Stead Family Department of Pediatrics and the Richard O. Jacobson Foundation Chair and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine. Dr. El-Shanti’s research focuses on the identification of genes responsible for human genetic disorders in an attempt to identify mechanisms and biologic pathways underlying physiologic and developmental processes. Dr. El-Shanti has an interest in clinical pediatrics and clinical genetics and the study of birth defects and genetic disorders, with particular interest in auto-inflammatory disorders, autism spectrum disorder, epilepsy and preterm birth.
Dr. Hatem El-Shanti graduated from Cairo University School of Medicine and trained in Pediatrics, Clinical Genetics and Cytogenetics at the University of Iowa and Indiana University. He has over 100 published manuscripts in peer reviewed journals, several book chapters, has served as a speaker at international conferences, and has received multiple international awards and research grant support. He is a member of multiple national, regional and international academic societies.
Hatem El-Shanti
Medical Genetics and Genomics, University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine