Ghalib Alkhatib received his Ph.D. in Molecular Virology from McGill University in Montreal, Canada in 1989. He completed his postdoctoral work at the Biotechnology Research Institute (BRI) in Montreal, where his research focused on the molecular immunology of natural killer (NK) cells. Subsequently, Alkhatib served as a visiting fellow in the Laboratory of Viral Diseases at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., from 1995 to 1998. During his fellowship, he identified and characterized CCR5 as the coreceptor for the macrophage-tropic (M-tropic) HIV-1 isolates. As a result of this groundbreaking research, CCR5 is now the target for the development of drugs that block HIV-1 infection. Alkhatib has held several academic positions, including assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis from 1997 to 2002 and Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Indiana University School of Medicine from 2003 to 2010. Alkhatib joined Southern Research Institute in July 2012, having previously served since 2010 as professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences and Center of Excellence for Infectious Diseases in the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in El Paso, Texas.
Recent Projects/Research
- Recombinant CCR5 as antiviral agents
Publications
- Alkhatib, G. , C. Combadiere, C.C. Boder, Y, Feng, P. Murphy & E.A. Berger. 1996. CC CKR5: a RANTES, MIP-1, MIP-1 Receptor as a Fusion Cofactor for Macrophage-Tropic HIV-1. Science 272: 1955-1958.
- Alkhatib G., Liao, F. , Berger, EA., Farber, JM., Peden, KW. 1997. A new SIV co-receptor, STRL33. Nature 388(6639):238.
- Agrawal, L., VanHorn-Ali, Berger, EA and Alkhatib G. 2004. Specific inhibition of HIV-1 coreceptor activity by synthetic peptides corresponding to the predicted extracellular loops of CCR5. BLOOD 103(4):1211-1217.
- Qingwen, J., Altenburg, J., Hossain, M. and Alkhatib, G. 2011. Role for the Conserved N-terminal Cysteines in the Anti-Chemokine Activities by the Chemokine-like Protein MC148R1 Encoded by Molluscum Contagiosum Virus. Virology 417: 449-456
Honors and Awards
- Medical Research Council of Canada (MRC) Post-Doctoral Fellowship (1991-1993)
- The NIH FARE Award for Research Excellence (3/1997)
- Travel award to attend the 7th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections, San Francisco, Calif. (2000)
- Travel award to attend the 9th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections, Seattle, WA (2002)
- Travel award (to Jeff Altenburg) to attend the 16th Annual AIDS Meeting, Toronto, Canada (August 13-18, 2006)
Courses Taught at New York Tech
- Case-Based Learning
- Hematology
- Immunology
- Dermatology