Innovation and Research keeps going at UCLA. We've put together a list of current COVID-19 research happening at UCLA.
As the COVID-19 continues to spread around the world, many people are feeling anxious and isolated. One of the most pressing challenges is the lack of information. But even in these uncertain times, there is an opportunity for us to join forces to STOP COVID19 TOGETHER. This project is a part of #TeamLA, and it aims to collect information that will help us understand how the coronavirus pandemic has affected our communities. Every individual can and should contribute, and by doing so will be joining our team effort to collect necessary data to stop the pandemic.
COVID - Eleazar Eskin, PhD - Cryptographic Anonymous Symptom Screening (CASS) Dr. Eleazar Eskin, Professor and Chair of Computational Medicine, has helped develop a public anonymous symptom screening survey that can be used to help protect employees of an institution while tracking changes in symptoms over time, making a map of exposures in an area, and tracking and measuring the effect of public health policies based on current...
COVID - Ben Wu, DDS, PhD - Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Dr. Ben Wu, Professor of Bioengineering and Material Science and Engineering, is leading one of many efforts at UCLA to design personal protective equipment (PPE) for first responders and health care workers. PPE, or equipment that acts as a barrier between the skin, mouth, nose, or eyes and viral and bacterial infections, is crucial in stopping both...
COVID - Nir Hoftman, MD - Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Dr. Nir Hoftman, an Anesthesiologist and Health Science Clinical Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine has worked with colleagues to design and develop a personal protective equipment (PPE) barrier device to protect health care workers from patients infected with contagious respiratory pathogens.
COVID - William Gelbart, Phd - Virology
Dr. William Gelbart’s laboratory in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry focuses on understanding how viruses “work” from a physical science point-of-view and how to use reconstituted non-infections forms of them for biotechnology and translational medicine purposes. Previously, Dr. Gelbart’s lab has developed virus-like-particles that deliver...
COVID - Paul Krogstad, MD - HIV Immunology and Pathogenesis
The laboratory of Dr. Paul Krogstad in the Department of Molecular & Medical Pharmacology focuses on molecular virology and the pathogenesis of viral diseases. Dr. Krogstad’s lab has recently developed a rapid, live virus assay to develop potent enterovirus inhibitors. Human enteroviruses (EVs) are a genus of more than 110 serologically distinct,...
COVID - Otto Yang, MD, ScD - Antiviral Immunity
The laboratory of Dr. Otto Yang in the Department of Medicine is interested in T cell immunology in HIV infection and developing immune therapies and vaccine for HIV, caner, and other viral infections. Dr. Yang’s laboratory has several technologies that may be of interest in treating coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2. Dr. Yang’s lab has developed...
COVID - Marcus Horwitz, MD - Antiviral and Antibacterial Vaccine Development
The laboratory of Dr. Marcus Horwitz in the Department of Medicine focuses on creating vaccines against Tier 1 Select Agents, which are infectious agents that pose a severe threat to the public and can cause diseases such as tularemia, anthrax, and plague. These pathogens have been identified as potential bioterror agents due to their survivability...
COVID - Genhong Cheng, PhD - Antiviral and Antibacterial Immune Response
The laboratory of Dr. Genhong Cheng in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics focuses on understanding the process of innate and adaptive immune responses in host defenses against bacterial infections, viral infections, and tumors. Dr. Cheng’s lab has previously created a novel method of generating live, attenuated influenza...
COVID - Samuel French, MD, PhD - Hepatitius C Infection and Hepatocarcinogenesis
The Samuel French laboratory in the UCLA Department of Cellular & Molecular Pathology is studying the impact of hepatitis C virus (HCV) on hepatocyte cell signaling that augments viral infection and promotes the development of hepatocellular carcinoma. Researchers primarily utilize a proteomic approach to identify pathways targeted by HCV to promote...
COVID - Ren Sun, PhD - Viral Replication and Characterization
The Ren Sun laboratory in the UCLA Department of Molecular & Medical Pharmacology is interested in characterizing virus replication capacity, in the presence of specific immune response, drug selection, and host-viral interactions. COVID-19 is a novel highly contagious coronavirus disease causing fever, coughing, and shortness of breath in severe cases....
COVID - Todd Yeates, PhD - Structural Biology and Supra-Molecular Protein Assembly
The Todd Yeates laboratory in the UCLA Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry studies supra-molecular protein assemblies. Recent investigations from the Yeates lab have focused on the characterization of organelle-like structures known as bacterial microcompartments, comprised of a protein shell encapsulating enzymes and other proteins. The lab has...
COVID - Vaithilingaraja Arumugaswami, PhD - Viral Pathogenesis
The Vaithi Arumugaswami laboratory in the UCLA Department of Pharmacology is dedicated to developing vaccines to protect against various diseases within the Flaviviridae family of viruses—Hepatitis C Virus, Zika Virus, and Dengue Virus. More recent work has focused on understanding the pathogenic mechanism of the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Currently,...
COVID - Manish Butte, MD, PhD - Mechanobiology and Immunology
The Manish Butte laboratory in the UCLA Department of Immunology, Allergy, and Rheumatology takes a clinical and translational approach to understanding T cells, the major coordinating cells of the immune response. Upon infection or conventional vaccination an immune response is triggered, priming naïve T and B cells to recognize certain molecules from...
COVID - Kenneth Bradley, PhD - Antimicrobial and Antiviral Pathogenesis
The Kenneth Bradley laboratory in the UCLA Department of Microbiology, Immunology & Molecular Genetics is interested in understanding how pathogens interact with their hosts to advance disease pathology. Specifically, the lab is working to identify host genes that are essential for bacterial toxins to exert their effects. Dr. Bradley has previously...
COVID - Andre Nel, Phd - Nanoparticle Drug Delivery
Dr. Andre Nel’s laboratory in the Department of Nanomedicine focuses on nanomedicine, allergy and immunology. Recent investigations from the Nel lab have focused on the development of nanoparticle treatment platforms that can be used for drug delivery, siRNA delivery, and imaging. Dr. Nel and colleagues have previously developed safer-by-design...
Intro: UCLA researchers in the Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology have discovered high affinity binding affibodies to COVID-19’s nucleocapsid protein that provide the basis for an ELISA-based diagnostic platform. The researchers are currently developing affibody-coated test strips for saliva detection of COVID-19 in high population settings...
COVID - Feng Guo, PhD - Structure and Function of Non-coding RNA
Structure-based design of antisense oligonucleotide drugs to combat COVID-19 Dr. Feng Guo is a structural biologist and biochemist who joined the UCLA School of Medicine faculty in July 2004. His current research interests include structure and function of non-coding RNA. Dr. Feng Guo’s group developed a method to characterize the three-dimensional...
COVID - Gerard Wong, PhD - Immunity and Antibiotics
Anti viral entry release transmission (AVERT) peptides Dr. Gerard C. L. Wong is a Professor in the Department of Bioengineering, Department of Chemistry, and the California NanoSystems Institute at UCLA. His current research interests include bacterial biofilm communities, innate immunity, and antibiotic design. Viruses infect hosts by gaining...
COVID - Daniel Kamei, PhD - Point--Of-Care (POC) Diagnostics
Point-of-care test for COVID-19 coronavirus diagnosis Dr. Daniel Kamei is a professor in the Department of Bioengineering at UCLA. One of the major goals of the Kamei Laboratory at UCLA is to develop novel point-of-care (POC) diagnostics that can lead to better patient management, faster administration of treatments, and improved outbreak prevention. Current...
COVID - Leonard Rome, PhD - Vault Nanoparticles
Human protein nanoparticle-based antiviral vaccine Dr. Leonard H. Rome, Ph.D., is a Distinguished Professor of Biological Chemistry and Associate Director of the California NanoSystems Institute. He served as the Senior Associate Dean for Research in the School of Medicine from 1997 to 2012. He is interested in studying the functions of novel nano-scale...
COVID - Lili Yang, PhD - Cancer Immune Response and Cell Immunotherapy
HSC-Engineered Off-The-Shelf iNKT Cell Therapy For COVID-19 Dr. Lili Yang is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Molecular Genetics at UCLA. The Yang Lab aims to develop gene and cell therapies that engineer patient immune systems to recognize and kill diseased cells and pathogens while leaving healthy...
COVID - Jamie Lloyd-Smith, PhD - Infectious Disease Models
Aerosol and surface stability of SARS-CoV-2 Dr. Jamie Lloyd-Smith is a professor at the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UCLA. His lab focuses on combining mathematical and computer models with field and laboratory data to understand how infectious diseases spread and evolve, and how to reduce their health impacts. Dr. Jamie...
2020-367 NEAR AND SHORTWAVE INFRARED POLYMETHINE DYES
Summary UCLA researchers in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry have developed improved bright and non-toxic polymethine dyes that will expand current medical optical imaging capabilities. Background As compared to light in the visible and near infrared (NIR) regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, light in the shortwave infrared (SWIR)...