Michael Mina (epidemiologist)

Last updated
Michael Mina
Born
Michael Joseph Mina
Alma mater Dartmouth College
Emory University
Scientific career
Fields Epidemiology, Ecology, Evolutionary biology, Genetics, Clinical pathology
Institutions
Thesis Cross-kingdom effects of a live attenuated viral vaccine on dynamics of and disease due to respiratory pathogens within divergent ecological domains: Introducing the generalized herd effect  (2014)
Doctoral advisor Keith P. Klugman

Michael Joseph Mina is an American epidemiologist, immunologist and physician. He was formerly an assistant professor of Epidemiology & Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, assistant Professor of Pathology at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, [1] and currently Chief Medical Officer at eMed. [2] and Chief Medical and Science Officer at Oncodea.

Contents

Mina is notable for his promotion of using rapid antigen tests to halt or slow the COVID-19 pandemic. [3]

Education

Mina attended Dartmouth College receiving his bachelor's degree in Engineering and Global Health in 2006. [4] He attended Emory University for his MD and PhD in the NIH Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP). [4] His PhD was in immunology and ecology of infectious diseases and vaccines. [5] Although receiving his PhD under the mentorship of Keith Klugman at Emory University, his doctoral research was performed at multiple sites including at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, Respiratory and Meningeal Pathogens Unit in Johannesburg, South Africa, the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, and the Emory Vaccine Center.

Mina completed post-doctoral training at Princeton University in the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and at Harvard Medical School in the department of Genetics. [6]

Mina also completed his medical residency training at Harvard Medical School, at the Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Clinical Pathology. [5] [7]

Career

At Princeton, Mina was based in Bryan Grenfell's laboratory, where he led research on the long-term immunological consequences of measles infections. The research led to the discovery that infection with measles can erase pre-existing immunological memory in a process called "immune amnesia." [8] The discovery was reported in Science in 2015 and suggests that measles was once responsible for as many as half of all childhood infectious diseases deaths. Mina and Grenfell have both suggested that the discovery implies that measles vaccines may be the most important vaccine in terms of reductions in childhood infectious disease mortality. [8]

As a post-doctoral fellow in genetics at Harvard, Mina worked with Professor Stephen Elledge where he furthered his research into immune amnesia. Using a tool called VirScan, which profiles hundreds of thousands of antibodies in a drop of blood that was developed earlier in Elledge's lab, they discovered that measles infections can erase between 20% and 80% of an individual's pre-existing antibodies. This discovery, also reported in Science in 2019, offered immunological evidence for the epidemiological and mathematical discovery made in 2015 with Grenfell.

Mina has more than 80 scientific publications, an H-index of 29, and over 3600 citations. The most cited articles are related to immunology and epidemiology. [9] His lab at Harvard conducted research related to vaccines, serology (antibody and antigen tests), infectious models and immunity. [7]

Mina claims that although the COVID PCR test is ideal for clinical testing, the paper tests (also known as "antigen tests" or "lateral flow tests" or "rapid tests") are superior to PCR tests for halting the pandemic because they are cheaper (about $1 to $5), faster (typically 15 minutes), [10] can be done at home, and can be anonymous (no reporting to government agencies). Mina claims that the paper tests' lower sensitivity makes them superior (for halting pandemics, not for clinical use) because they are positive mostly only when one is contagious whereas the PCR tests are typically positive for weeks after one is no longer contagious. [3]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Immunology</span> Branch of medicine studying the immune system

Immunology is a branch of biology and medicine that covers the study of immune systems in all organisms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vaccine</span> Pathogen-derived preparation that provides acquired immunity to an infectious disease

A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious or malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verified. A vaccine typically contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism and is often made from weakened or killed forms of the microbe, its toxins, or one of its surface proteins. The agent stimulates the body's immune system to recognize the agent as a threat, destroy it, and recognize further and destroy any of the microorganisms associated with that agent that it may encounter in the future.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Immunization</span> Process by which an individuals immune system becomes fortified against an infectious agent

Immunization, or immunisation, is the process by which an individual's immune system becomes fortified against an infectious agent.

In biology, immunity is the state of being insusceptible or resistant to a noxious agent or process, especially a pathogen or infectious disease. Immunity may occur naturally or be produced by prior exposure or immunization.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Respiratory syncytial virus</span> Species of virus

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), also called human respiratory syncytial virus (hRSV) and human orthopneumovirus, is a contagious virus that causes infections of the respiratory tract. It is a negative-sense, single-stranded RNA virus. Its name is derived from the large cells known as syncytia that form when infected cells fuse.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Seroconversion</span> Development of specific antibodies in the blood serum as a result of infection or immunization

In immunology, seroconversion is the development of specific antibodies in the blood serum as a result of infection or immunization, including vaccination. During infection or immunization, antigens enter the blood, and the immune system begins to produce antibodies in response. Before seroconversion, the antigen itself may or may not be detectable, but the antibody is absent. During seroconversion, the antibody is present but not yet detectable. After seroconversion, the antibody is detectable by standard techniques and remains detectable unless the individual seroreverts, in a phenomenon called seroreversion, or loss of antibody detectability, which can occur due to weakening of the immune system or decreasing antibody concentrations over time. Seroconversion refers the production of specific antibodies against specific antigens, meaning that a single infection could cause multiple waves of seroconversion against different antigens. Similarly, a single antigen could cause multiple waves of seroconversion with different classes of antibodies. For example, most antigens prompt seroconversion for the IgM class of antibodies first, and subsequently the IgG class.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases is one of the 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). NIAID's mission is to conduct basic and applied research to better understand, treat, and prevent infectious, immunologic, and allergic diseases.

Serology is the scientific study of serum and other body fluids. In practice, the term usually refers to the diagnostic identification of antibodies in the serum. Such antibodies are typically formed in response to an infection, against other foreign proteins, or to one's own proteins. In either case, the procedure is simple.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Conjugate vaccine</span> Type of vaccine

A conjugate vaccine is a type of subunit vaccine which combines a weak antigen with a strong antigen as a carrier so that the immune system has a stronger response to the weak antigen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Original antigenic sin</span> Immune phenomenon

Original antigenic sin, also known as antigenic imprinting, the Hoskins effect, immunological imprinting, or primary addiction is the propensity of the immune system to preferentially use immunological memory based on a previous infection when a second slightly different version of that foreign pathogen is encountered. This leaves the immune system "trapped" by the first response it has made to each antigen, and unable to mount potentially more effective responses during subsequent infections. Antibodies or T-cells induced during infections with the first variant of the pathogen are subject to repertoire freeze, a form of original antigenic sin.

Artificial induction of immunity is immunization achieved by human efforts in preventive healthcare, as opposed to natural immunity as produced by organisms' immune systems. It makes people immune to specific diseases by means other than waiting for them to catch the disease. The purpose is to reduce the risk of death and suffering, that is, the disease burden, even when eradication of the disease is not possible. Vaccination is the chief type of such immunization, greatly reducing the burden of vaccine-preventable diseases.

A breakthrough infection is a case of illness in which a vaccinated individual becomes infected with the illness, because the vaccine has failed to provide complete immunity against the pathogen. Breakthrough infections have been identified in individuals immunized against a variety of diseases including mumps, varicella (Chickenpox), influenza, and COVID-19. The characteristics of the breakthrough infection are dependent on the virus itself. Often, infection of the vaccinated individual results in milder symptoms and shorter duration than if the infection were contracted naturally.

In immunology, an adjuvant is a substance that increases or modulates the immune response to a vaccine. The word "adjuvant" comes from the Latin word adiuvare, meaning to help or aid. "An immunologic adjuvant is defined as any substance that acts to accelerate, prolong, or enhance antigen-specific immune responses when used in combination with specific vaccine antigens."

Gerald Domingue is an American medical researcher and academic who served as Professor of Urology, Microbiology and Immunology in the Tulane University School of Medicine and Graduate School for thirty years and also as Director of Research in Urology. He is currently retired and resides in Zürich, Switzerland, where he is engaged in painting and creative writing. At retirement he was honored with the title of Professor Emeritus at Tulane (1967–1997). Prior to Tulane, he was faculty of Saint Louis University School of Medicine); was a lecturer at Washington University School of Dentistry and director of clinical microbiology in St. Louis City Hospital, St. Louis, Missouri.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vaccine Research Center</span>

The Vaccine Research Center (VRC), is an intramural division of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The mission of the VRC is to discover and develop both vaccines and antibody-based products that target infectious diseases.

A neutralizing antibody (NAb) is an antibody that defends a cell from a pathogen or infectious particle by neutralizing any effect it has biologically. Neutralization renders the particle no longer infectious or pathogenic. Neutralizing antibodies are part of the humoral response of the adaptive immune system against viruses, bacteria and microbial toxin. By binding specifically to surface structures (antigen) on an infectious particle, neutralizing antibodies prevent the particle from interacting with its host cells it might infect and destroy.

Barton Ford Haynes is an American physician and immunologist internationally recognized for work in T-cell immunology, retrovirology, and HIV vaccine development. Haynes is a Frederic M. Hanes Professor of Medicine and Immunology at Duke University Medical Center. He is the director of the Duke Human Vaccine Institute and the Duke Center for HIV/AIDS Vaccine Immunology and Immunogen Discovery (CHAVI-ID), which was funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in 2012. In addition, Haynes directs the B-cell Lineage Envelope Design Study, the Centralized Envelope Phase I Study, and the Role of IgA in HIV-1 Protection Study as part of the Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery (CAVD), which was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2006.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Thomas Ryan</span> American microbiologist

Edward Thomas Ryan is an American microbiologist, immunologist, and physician at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital. Ryan served as president of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene from 2009 to 2010. Ryan is Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and Director of Global Infectious Diseases at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Ryan's research and clinical focus has been on infectious diseases associated with residing in, immigrating from, or traveling through resource-limited areas. Ryan is a Fellow of the American Society of Microbiology, the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, the American College of Physicians, and the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

Immunological memory is the ability of the immune system to quickly and specifically recognize an antigen that the body has previously encountered and initiate a corresponding immune response. Generally, they are secondary, tertiary and other subsequent immune responses to the same antigen. The adaptive immune system and antigen-specific receptor generation are responsible for adaptive immune memory.

Dan Hung Barouch is an American physician, immunologist, and virologist. He is known for his work on the pathogenesis and immunology of viral infections and the development of vaccine strategies for global infectious diseases.

References

  1. ↑ Mandavilli, Apoorva (29 August 2020). "Your Coronavirus Test Is Positive. Maybe It Shouldn't Be". The New York Times. Retrieved 8 February 2021.
  2. ↑ Krueger, Hanna (22 December 2021). "Michael Mina can't stop talking about the need for rapid COVID tests. The country may finally be listening. But is it too late?". Boston Globe. Retrieved 29 December 2021.
  3. 1 2 Kotlikoff, Laurence; Mina, Michael (3 July 2020). "A Cheap, Simple Way to Control the Coronavirus". The New York Times. Retrieved 8 February 2021.
  4. 1 2 "2020 Baccalaureate Features Senior Fellow Michael Mina '06". dartmouth.edu. Dartmouth College. 26 May 2020.
  5. 1 2 "Michael Mina". The Conversation. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
  6. ↑ "eMed Names Leading Epidemiologist Michael Mina, MD, PhD, as Chief Science Officer". prnewswire.com. 18 November 2021.
  7. 1 2 "Michael Mina - Bio, Harvard University". Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  8. 1 2 Frederick, Eva (31 October 2019). "How measles causes the body to 'forget' past infections by other microbes". science.org.
  9. ↑ "scholar". scholar.google.com. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  10. ↑ Larremore DB, Wilder B, Lester E, Shehata S, Burke JM, Hay JA; et al. (2021). "Test sensitivity is secondary to frequency and turnaround time for COVID-19 screening". Sci Adv. 7 (1). Bibcode:2021SciA....7.5393L. doi:10.1126/sciadv.abd5393. PMC   7775777 . PMID   33219112.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
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