ONLINE: The Colombia-Wisconsin One Health Effort: Innovation and the Study of Emerging Diseases

press release: Please join UW Latin American, Caribbean and Iberian Studies Program for the LACIS Lunchtime Lecture, Tuesdays at noon. The events will be virtual (on Zoom) for the 2020-21 school year, and are free and open to the public.

About the presenters:  Presented by Leonor Hidalgo Ciro, Jorge Osorio, and Juan Pablo Hernandez

Juan Pablo Hernandez-Ortiz is a Professor at the Department of Materials and Nanotechnology at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Sede Medellín.  He is the co-Director of the Colombia/Wisconsin One-Health Consortium and the One-Health Genomic Laboratory. Professor Hernandez-Ortiz received his Mechanical Engineering Degree from the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Medellin, Colombia in 1998. He did his Ph.D. studies, in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Chemical Engineering, at UW-Madison.  In 2004, he started his postdoctoral training at UW-Madison in Chemical and Biological Engineering.  In 2007, he joined the Department of Materials and Nanotechnology as an Assistant Professor and became the youngest person to become a Full Professor at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in 2013. He has authored and co-authored more than 90 articles and advised 16 graduate students. His field of action in biophysics started several years ago and it was centered on designing devices for an efficient and high-resolution presentation of long DNA molecules towards single-molecule genome analysis and nematic-based biological sensors. During the last decade, Professor Hernández-Ortiz has dedicated his research efforts in guided molecular engineering towards personalized medicine platforms for infectious diseases, cancer, and tropical pathologies. He has established fever clinics and disease monitoring in multiple regions of Colombia, including Cucuta, Cali, Medellin, Villavicencio, and Leticia. The current diseases attended by his group are arboviruses (Dengue, Zika, Chikungunya, and Yellow Fever), influenza, SARS-CoV-2, and solid-tumor cancer diseases.

Leonor Hidalgo Ciro is a key member of the senior management team at Ruta N Corporation, a non-profit organization focused on innovation for the city of Medellin. She is responsible for the design and execution of projects and policies with the overall goal of improving quality of life through innovation. She has a degree in law from the University of Antioquia and an MA in political studies from the National University of Colombia. She has more than 15 years as a public servant, Currently, she is a Fulbright fellow at Special Program for Urban and Regional Planning at MIT.

Dr. Jorge Osorio, DVM, MS, PhD, is a Full Professor in the Department of Pathobiological Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, at UW-Madison. Dr Osorio has had a lengthy career in the medical sciences, ranging from microbiology, field epidemiological studies, vaccinations, and vector control programs. He is the co-Director of a Colombia-Wisconsin One Health Consortium, a joint effort between the University of Wisconsin and many institutions in Colombia that is studying emerging diseases and One-Health issues. Dr. Osorio was also a co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Inviragen, a biotechnology company that developed a novel chimeric tetravalent dengue vaccine that recently completed successfully Phase 3 clinical trials. He also developed vaccines against chikungunya, influenza, Zika, rabies, plague, and many other emerging infectious diseases. Dr. Osorio was also the Vice-President of Research and Vice-President of Scientific Affairs for the Vaccine Business Division of Takeda Pharmaceuticals. He has over 30 years of experience in research and more than 140 scientific publications in peer review international journals. In addition to Inviragen and Takeda, his industry career included positions at Heska Corporation (Ft. Collins, CO), Merial LTD (Athens, GA), and Chiron-Powderject Vaccines (Madison, WI). Currently, Dr. Osorio and his colleagues at UW-Madison are establishing a state-of-the-art research group that uses molecular approaches to design novel vaccines and unravel host-pathogen interactions for emerging diseases.

Please register HERE. Once you are registered, you will have access to the Zoom meeting shortly before the presentation begins.