Nelson L. Michael, M.D., Ph.D. is the Director of the U.S. Military HIV Research Program (MHRP) at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, an international HIV vaccine research program that successfully integrates HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment.
Dr. Michael’s career has focused on developing an effective HIV vaccine to protect U.S. and Allied Armed Services and reduce the global impact of the disease. MHRP’s international research program has six clinical research sites in the U.S., Africa and Asia, where the program has conducted cohort studies and HIV vaccine trials. Dr. Michael guided MHRP through the completion of the RV144 HIV vaccine study in Thailand, which provided the world’s first demonstration that a preventive HIV vaccine was possible.
More recently, Dr. Michael helped lead a study on a new vaccine regimen that partially protected monkeys from HIV-like infection. This research also identified factors associated with HIV prevention and control, and identified new HIV vaccine candidates to test in human clinical trials.
A Colonel in the United States Army Medical Corps, Dr. Michael entered his Army service in 1989 in the program’s Department of Vaccine Research and later served as the Chief, Department of Molecular Diagnostics and Pathogenesis. He was appointed Director in 2006. His research interests include HIV molecular pathogenesis and host genetics, HIV clinical research, and HIV vaccine development. He is currently an Associate Professor of Medicine, Uniformed Services University, and is a Diplomat, American Board of Internal Medicine.
Dr. Michael currently serves on the Vaccine Research Center Scientific Advisory Working Group (NIAID, NIH), Office of AIDS Research Advisory Committee (NIH), AIDS Research Advisory Committee (NIAID, NIH), AIDS Vaccine Research Working Group (DAIDS, NIAID, and NIH), Center for HIV/AIDS Vaccine Immunology Scientific Advisory Board, Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator Scientific Steering Committee, the Scientific Committee of the Global HIV AIDS Vaccine Enterprise, and the PEPFAR Scientific Advisory Board.
He graduated summa cum laude from University of California-Los Angeles in 1979 with a degree in biology, and from Stanford University with M.D. and Ph.D. (cancer biology) degrees in 1986. He trained in internal medicine at Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital from 1986–1989. Dr. Michael has co-authored 135 papers in the peer-reviewed scientific literature.
