Kong Research Group

The Virology Core is committed to developing new vaccine candidates and new vaccine vector systems for antigen delivery against human pathogens. The Virology Core also applies and develops new molecular biology technology to evaluate vaccine candidates to facilitate vaccine development.  

Wing-Pui Kong, Ph.D.

Chief, Virology Core

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Education: Ph.D., 1993, The University of Chicago, IL

Dr. Kong received his Ph.D. in 1993 in virology at the University of Chicago, where he studied the molecular pathogenesis of picornaviruses, a class of viruses that contribute to the development of central nervous system disease. He made significant contributions to the elucidation of the mechanism by which these viruses induce disease. Dr. Kong then completed a postdoctoral fellowship and...

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Wing-Pui Kong, Ph.D.

Audrey Carson, B.A.

Postbaccalaureate Fellow

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Education:

B.A., Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH

Audrey is a postbaccalaureate fellow on the animal studies team, where her research assesses HIV-1 vaccine candidates through the elicited humoral response in animal models. She also contributes to the development and evaluation of novel HIV-1 immunogens.

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Xuejun Chen, Ph.D.

Lab Manager, Staff Scientist 

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Education:

Ph.D., Rutgers University

M.S., John Hopkins University

B.S., Peking University

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Chen’s research focuses on development of HIV vaccines targeting the vulnerable epitopes of the HIV envelope to elicit broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs), especially VRC-01 class bnAbs. He tests candidate vaccine regimens in various animal models for their ability to elicit bnAbs and isolates and characterizes the elicited antibodies to guide further vaccine design. As the lab manager, he...

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Cheng Cheng, Ph.D.

Staff Scientist 

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Education:

Ph.D., Nagoya University

Languages Spoken: Chinese, Japanese

As leader of the HIV-1 Vaccine Group, Dr. Cheng is responsible for developing HIV-1 vaccine candidates that elicit neutralizing antibodies. The group focuses on structure-based design of immunogens to target vulnerable sites of the native spike of HIV-1. The vaccine candidates are evaluated in animal models and in human clinical trials.

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Misook Choe, M.S.

Biologist 

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Education:

M.S., Gyeongsang National University

B.S., Gyeongsang National University

Languages Spoken: Korean

Misook Choe has skills in recombinant protein production and characterization to produce immunogens, monoclonal antibody reagents, antibodies against SARS-CoV-2, HIV, and Ebola. She has more than 16 years of experience in molecular cloning, cell biology, performing PCR, DNA and RNA preparation, mammalian cell transfection, using CHO cells for scale up production in a bioreactor, ELISA, and...

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Arik Cooper, Ph.D.

Senior Scientist 

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Education:

Ph.D., Weizmann Institute of Science
B.S., Tel Aviv University

Dr. Cooper's research interests are the mechanisms of HIV-1 replication, pathogenesis, and persistence. His work focuses on virus-host cell interactions with the aim of discovering novel therapeutic strategies for HIV-1 cure and prevention.

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Hongying Duan (Holdsworth), M.D., Ph.D.

Staff Scientist

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Education:

M.D., Shandong University, China

Ph.D., Saitama Medical University, Japan

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Duan received her M.D. degree from Shandong University, China, and received her Ph.D. degree from Saitama Medical University, Japan in Biomedical Research/Microbiology. She worked as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in U.S. Food and Drug Administration, (CBER), Laboratory of Hepatitis Viruses between 2008-2014. She joined Vaccine Research Center in 2014.

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Portrait of Hongying Duan (Holdsworth), Ph.D.

Cuiping Liu, Ph.D.

Senior Scientist 

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Education:

Ph.D., Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Liu conducts research and development on nanoparticle vaccine candidates and therapeutic antibodies against coronaviruses and other infections pathogens. She is also responsible for standardizing assays and assay development, including but not limited to ELISA, autoreactivity assays of monoclonal antibodies, and binding assays. In addition, she also oversees protein production with low...

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Krisha McKee, M.S.

Biologist

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Education:

M.S., Johns Hopkins University

Part of the Neutralization Team within the Virology Core, Krisha McKee runs cell-based HIV-1 neutralization assays to measure neutralization responses from novel HIV immunization animal studies and from improved HIV antibodies for clinical use. She also coordinates and analyzes data from a high-throughput 208-virus panel, which are used in publications and to evaluate products for clinical...

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Katelyn T. Nguyen, M.S.

Postbaccalaureate IRTA Fellow

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Education:

M.S., University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA
B.S., University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA

Languages Spoken: Vietnamese

Katelyn’s work involves isolating and characterizing antibodies elicited by various vaccination regimens in animal models. Her goal is to identify bnAbs in efforts to evaluate the efficacy of pre-clinical vaccine candidates against HIV and other infectious pathogens.

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Qi Qiu, Ph.D.

Scientist

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Education:

Ph.D., Nanjing University, China 
M.D., Southeast University School of Medicine, China

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Qiu’s research focuses on evaluating neutralization activities of vaccinated human and animal sera and monoclonal antibodies against coronaviruses (CoV) and influenza.

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George S. Sellers, B.S.

Postbaccalaureate Fellow

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Education:

B.S., Biology University of Maryland

Languages Spoken: Chinese

George’s research focuses on structure-based design of immunogens for HIV vaccine development with the goal of eliciting broadly neutralizing antibodies. He also works on evaluating on the effectiveness of vaccine candidates in ex-vivo and animal models.

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Wei Shi, M.D., Ph.D.

Biologist

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Education:

Ph.D., Uppsala University, Sweden

M.D., TongJi Medical College of HUST, Wuhan, China

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Shi research focuses on the design and development of pan-coronavirus vaccines and broadly neutralizing monoclonal antibodies against coronaviruses, a virus-like particle (VPL) vaccine for enterovirus-D68 (EV-D68), and protein probes for HIV, influenza, EV-D68, coronavirus, and for monoclonal antibodies discovery, such as SARS-CoV-2-S1, SARS-CoV-2 RBD and SARS-CoV-2 NTD, and hu-ACE2. He is...

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Kayla A. Stanczak, B.A.

Postbaccalaureate IRTA Fellow

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Education:

B.A., Washington & Jefferson College

As a member of the Virology Core, Kayla Stanczak evaluates promising clinical treatment options for HIV-1 infection in an ex vivo environment. Her research focuses on identifying genotypic and phenotypic HIV-1 escape mechanisms that enable viral growth in the presence of broadly neutralizing antibodies.

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Emily A. Tourtellott, M.S.

Biologist

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Education:

M.S., University of Maryland Global Campus
B.S., Virginia Tech

As a biologist, Emily Tourtellott performs virus neutralization assays for the Virology Core lab to assess the efficacy of vaccine and monoclonal antibody therapy candidates against HIV-1 and SARS-CoV-2. She also works to develop new HIV panels to better characterize current globally circulating strains of HIV-1.

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Lingshu Wang, Ph.D.

Staff Scientist 

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Education:

Ph.D., Shanghai JiaoTong University, China

Languages Spoken: Mandarin

Dr. Wang leads a team to assess neutralization activities of vaccinated animal sera and monoclonal antibodies against coronaviruses (CoV) and influenza. She designs and evaluates subunit and gene-based vaccines against CoV, flu, Enterovirus-D68 (EV-D68). Additionally, she isolates and identifies potent neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern and other CoVs.

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Eun Sung Yang, M.A.

Biologist

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Education:

M.A., Seoul National University

B.A., Seoul National University

Languages Spoken: Korean

Eun Sung Yang specializes in animal studies, including studying the pharmacokinetic and immunogenic properties of therapeutics and vaccine candidates. She also has expertise in pseudovirus production for infectious viruses such as HIV-1, influenza, and coronavirus and performing neutralization assays using them.

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Qiong Zhou, M.S.

Research Scientist

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Education:

M.S.

In the lab, Qiong is working on CoV mAb discovery and vaccine development, as well as SARS-CoV-2, influenza, HIV, and neutralization assays.

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Former Research Group Members

  • Andrea Biju, B.S., Turnstone Biologics
  • Sam Charaf, B.S., University of Virginia School of Medicine
  • Man Chen, M.D., Retired
  • Sabrina Helmold Hait, Ph.D., The National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases
  • Kwanyee Leung, Ph.D., Retired
  • Sarah E. Lovelace, B.S., Baylor College of Medicine
  • Jonah S. Merriam, B.S., The Scripps Research Institute
  • Danealle K. Parchment, B.S., University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
  • Amarendra Pegu, Ph.D., Generate:Biomedicines
  • Hannah R. Shrader, B.S., B.A., University of Oxford
  • Chloe Adrienna G. Talana, B.S., University of Pennsylvania
  • Yi Zhang, B.S., AstraZeneca
  • Jeffrey Boyington, Ph.D., Retired 
  • Keyun Wang, B.S., Des Moines University 
  • Yen-Ting Lai, Ph.D., Moderna 
  • Sung-Youl Ko, Ph.D., iLAB, Co., Ltd. 
  • Gordon Joyce, Ph.D., Walter Reed Army Institute of Research 
  • Rebecca Rudicell, Ph.D., Sanofi 
  • Kevin Saunders, Ph.D., Duke University 
  • Daniel Lingwood, Ph.D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology 
  • Hadi Yassine, Ph.D., Qatar University 
  • Guillaume Stewart-Jones, Ph.D., Moderna 
  • Mangaiarkarasi Asokan, Ph.D., Christian Medical College Vellore 
  • Tiffany Chan, M.S., GSK  
  • Kurt Hill, B.S., Thomas Jefferson Medical School 
  • Michelle Cully, B.S., University of Pennsylvania 
  • Edward Sarfo, B.S., Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai 
  • Megan DeMouth, B.S., Albert Einstein College of Medicine 
  • Angela Corrigan, B.S., University of Pennsylvania 
  • Samhita Sengupta, B.S., Georgetown University  
  • Cassandra Almasri, B.S., Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center 
  • Harlan Pietz, B.S., The Rockefeller University 
  • Angela Wu, B.S., University of Maryland 
  • Alexander Jafari, B.S., Tulane University School of Medicine 
  • Anna Maximova, B.S., University of Maryland 
  • Zacchary Mankoff, B.S., Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania 
  • Timothy Wanninger, B.S., University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston 
  • Rita Chen, B.S., Washington University 
  • Adam Bossert, B.S., Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
  • Paul Thomas, B.S.— University of California, San Francisco
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