Our People
Executive Leadership
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President and Director
The major objective of Dr. Reiley’s research is to advance the understanding of the generation and maintenance of T cell immunity during acute and persistent infections, including influenza, herpes virus and Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) infections. His past studies demonstrated that the antigen-specific T cell response, while slow to develop during Tuberculosis infection, is maintained throughout the chronic infection through a process of both proliferation and renewal from newly derived cells originating from the bone marrow. Current studies being carried out in collaboration with Dr’s Blackman and Sun, from UCLA, focus on understanding how a history of prior infections impact the immune response to vaccination or subsequent infection, specifically subsequent influenza virus infections and live-attenuated influenza virus vaccines. Additional studies being carried out in his lab is aimed at examining how antigen availability and the granuloma structure impacts the cellular response.
In addition to his role as a Trudeau’s Director, Dr. Reiley also runs the contract research organization, TICRO BioServices. Within TICRO, he provides pharma clients standardized and customized preclinical services to develop the next generation of vaccines and/or anti-infective therapies using established in vivo mouse models. During this past year TICRO has expanding its services to include additional strains of pathogens and disease models to continue to meet the growing needs of our pharmaceutical clients.
Dr. Reiley earned his Ph.D. in Cellular and Molecular Biology from Penn State University. He completed his postdoctoral work under Dr. Woodland at Trudeau Institute.
Publications
Scientific Leadership
The power to unleash modern medical breakthroughs lies at the apex of our expertise in immunity and pathogen research.
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sbradrick@trudeauinstitute.org
Senior Study Director, TICRO BioServices at Trudeau Institute
Principal Investigator at Trudeau Institute
Dr. Shelton Bradrick is a virologist with over twenty years of experience working with pathogenic RNA viruses.
Dr. Bradrick earned his Ph.D. at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in 2002 studying acute myocarditis caused by coxsackieviruses.
He subsequently conducted postdoctoral work at Duke University Medical Center, working initially with hepatitis C virus and then transitioning to mosquito borne flaviviruses as an Assistant Research Professor.
In 2015, Dr. Bradrick was recruited to the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston as an Assistant Professor where he continued to work on flaviviruses and molecular mechanisms of multiple sclerosis.
In 2019, Dr. Bradrick transitioned to a Principal Scientist position with MRIGlobal, a non-profit applied research institute located in Kansas City, MO. While at MRIGlobal, Dr. Bradrick led a variety of projects for government and industry clients, focusing significantly on applied research addressing the COVID-19 pandemic as well as biodefense programs.
Dr. Bradrick joined TICRO Bioservices and the Trudeau Institute in March, 2023 to continue directing projects in basic and applied research with particular emphasis on RNA viruses, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, and other significant human pathogen.
Publications
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Trudeau Principal Investigator
Manager, Joint Educational Programs
TRN Research Scientist, Influenza and Vaccines ProgramDeborah M. Brown, Ph.D., is a Principal Investigator at Trudeau Institute in Upstate New York, USA, as well as an adjunct Associate Professor at Clarkson University. She received her Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry in 2002 and received a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) Individual Postdoctoral Fellowship to complete her postdoctoral work in the lab of Dr. Suzy Swain at Trudeau Institute in 2008. As an Associate Professor with tenure at University of Nebraska-Lincoln, she developed a passion for undergraduate and graduate education, developing curriculum and instructing students in Immunology, Vaccine Biology and Professionalism while mentoring 4 Ph.D. students and numerous undergraduate students before returning to Trudeau Institute in 2019 to oversee the Joint Educational Programs with Clarkson University.
Dr. Brown applies her over 20 years’ experience in research and academia at a medical school, land-grant university and not-for-profit research institute to teach students to be critical thinkers as they navigate their career paths in the STEM fields. With a background in cellular immunology, she has published more than 50 scientific articles on diverse topics such as anti-tumor immune responses, the role of CD4 T cells in viral infections, anti-influenza vaccine strategies, and active learning techniques in the classroom. Her recent research focuses on understanding how vaccine adjuvants that trigger innate immunity can provide memory responses and protection against influenza viral infection. She uses this project to teach students in Immunology and Immunological Techniques and supervises a unique, immersive 15-week semester long hands-on research project for Clarkson students. Since 2009 she has been passionate about training the next generation of scientists in the research enterprise, research methodology and scientific communication and provides a summer research experience for undergraduates based on nationally recognized REU programs across the country. As a member of the American Association of Immunologists (AAI) Teaching Interest Group, she has helped craft the undergraduate Immunology curriculum and is a participant in the AAI’s active learning workshops each year. She is keenly involved in expanding Trudeau Institute’s Educational Programs to include certificate programs for laboratory scientists as a pathway to the workforce and graduate student training in microbiology and immunology within various labs at Trudeau Institute.
Publications
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mchojnacki@trudeauinstitute.org
Trudeau Principal Investigator
Dr. Chojnacki’s research is focused on the discovery, characterization and optimization of antimicrobial therapeutics for the treatment of pathogens of immediate healthcare concern, including Mycobacterium tuberculosis and nontuberculous mycobacteria. Current treatments for these pathogens are complex, lengthy and have undesirable side effects. As a result, cases of multi-drug resistant organisms are on the rise. New antibiotics are often chemically similar, target the same few bacterial pathways for which mechanisms of resistance are well established, and are slow to come to market. Therefore, the discovery of chemically distinct therapeutics that act via novel mechanisms is necessary to overcome the emergence of resistant strains.
Working within a team of investigators with expertise in bacterial survival mechanisms, chemogenomics and drug discovery, Dr. Chojnacki aims to exploit novel bacterial drug targets and further characterize and develop lead molecules that have been rationally selected based on in silico screening.
Dr. Chojnacki has a background in understanding bacterial antimicrobial recalcitrant disease states. Using bacterial pathogens of urgent concern to human health as model organisms (i.e. MRSA), Dr. Chojnacki has worked extensively on defining and exploiting drivers of disease-associated, physiologically relevant bacterial growth states that can be targeted by innovative therapeutics. Utilizing various antibacterial drug discovery approaches, including the implementation of animal models of infection, these lines of investigation serve to solve the immediate void in the antimicrobial pipeline as well as to uncover and illuminate disease processes that are likely to be conserved across pathogens of immediate and emerging healthcare concern.
Dr. Chojnacki earned her M.S. in biochemistry and her Ph.D. in microbiology & immunology from SUNY at Buffalo. She was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Rochester in the laboratory of Dr. Paul Dunman.
Publications
National Library of Medicine Michaelle Chojnacki Bibliography
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Trudeau Principal Investigator
TRN Senior Immunologist and Leader, Flavivirus Research PlatformDr. Kim was trained as a viral immunologist with an emphasis on comprehensive understanding of viral pathogenesis and host immune control against acute and chronic virus infections. Her current research focuses on studying Dengue and Zika virus infections using mouse and non-human primate (NHP) marmoset models. Her research goals include understanding immune pathogenesis, the intervention of vertical virus transmission from mother to fetus, and the evaluation of prophylactic vaccines and antiviral therapies against these viruses that are threats to public health.
Prior to joining Trudeau Institute in 2016, she was extensively involved in preclinical and clinical studies in development of vaccines against HIV, nicotine, allergy/asthma in the Vaccine research unit, Pfizer Inc. Ottawa, Canada for 2009-2015. She brings this experience to her role as the leader of the Flavivirus Research Platform team to develop tools to assess the efficacy of vaccines and therapeutics.
In 1999, Dr. Kim earned her Ph.D. in Viral Immunology at the University of Minnesota at Twin Cities. Afterward, she joined the laboratory of Dr. Marcia Blackman at Trudeau Institute, she studied γ herpesvirus latency as a post-doctoral fellow.
Publications
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fsheinerman@trudeauinstitute.org
Trudeau Principal Investigator
Head of ChemogenomicsDr. Sheinerman brings 16 years of drug discovery experience working in big pharma (Aventis/sanofi-aventis) and biotech (nPharmakon/Lodo Therapeutics) to his current position at Trudeau Institute. During seven years at Aventis and sanofi-aventis Dr. Sheinerman worked in bio- and chemo-Informatics, computer-aided drug design and chemogenomics supporting >100 programs across different therapeutic areas and target structural classes, with a particular focus on druggable target families. At nPharmakon, where Dr. Sheinerman served as a co-founder and the Chief Scientific Officer, he led development of novel drug retargeting technology, characterization of several leads for indications in oncology, fibrosis, and inflammation, and advancement of one program through pre-clinical development to demonstration of efficacy in a double-blind clinical study.
Dr. Sheinerman holds a Ph.D. in Macromolecular and Cellular Structure and Chemistry from The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA, and was an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in Computational Biology at Columbia University, New York.
Dr. Sheinerman’s research at Trudeau Institute focuses on the development of novel chemogenomic approaches to anti-infective drug discovery, and the identification and development of small molecule tools, leads, and drug candidates against viral and bacterial infections, including drug-resistant tuberculosis.
Publications:
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bweinrick@trudeauinstitute.org
Trudeau Principal Investigator
Lead Investigator, Tuberculosis R&D Program
Associate at the Albert Einstein College of MedicineDr. Weinrick’s research focuses on survival mechanisms of tuberculosis bacilli. Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis, is estimated to infect over a quarter of the human population and is the greatest cause of mortality by a single microbe. Dr. Weinrick has substantial experience in evaluating the genetic requirements for and regulation of virulence in bacterial pathogens, including animal models of infection for gram-negative, gram-positive, and mycobacteria, and has employed new approaches to the systems level characterization of microbial pathogens, combining genomic, transcriptomic, and metabolomic tools.
Dr. Weinrick earned his Ph.D. in Microbiology from NYU School of Medicine. He was a postdoctoral fellow and research associate in the laboratory of Dr. William R. Jacobs Jr. at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
Publications
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Head of the Histology and Imaging Core
Manager of the Flow cytometry and cell sorting facilityMr. Tighe has over 25 years of experience beginning as a research technician to the head of the histology and imaging core facility. This core facility provides support for the Trudeau Research Network, Trudeau’s contract research organization, and many outside collaborators. Experienced in many histological techniques, Mr. Tighe and the core facility staff can handle a wide range of services from common applications such as tissue collection, fixation, processing, sectioning, staining, and imaging, to more complex protocols like immuno-histochemical, immuno-fluorescent and in-situ hybridization techniques. The core maintains multiple microscopes for analysis and imaging of pathogens, cells, and tissues. Microscopes include brightfield, darkfield, fluorescent, and laser scanning confocal microscopes. Mr. Tighes’ images have appeared on the covers of several scientific journals including the Journal of Immunology, Immunity, and Viral Immunology.
Mr. Tighe earned his Associates of Applied Science degree in Laboratory Technology from the State University of New York, Agricultural and Technical College at Canton, New York.