Mullins named chair of Microbiology Department

Mullins

Dr. James Mullins has been named chair of the School of Medicine’s Department of Microbiology, subject to approval by the UW Board of Regents.

A professor of microbiology and interim chair since 1997, Mullins joined the department in 1994 from Stanford University School of Medicine, where he had chaired the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. At the UW, he is also a professor of medicine and an adjunct professor of laboratory medicine.

Mullins’ lab studies AIDS by focusing on the dynamics and evolution of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) within and between infected individuals. Through collaboration with clinical investigators and other basic scientists, his laboratory is defining the events that lead to AIDS in HIV-infected individuals and the impact of immune responses and antiretroviral therapies on this process. Such work is important for the creation of an AIDS vaccine.

Mullins received a Ph.D. in cell biology and biochemistry from the University of Minnesota in 1978. He conducted postdoctoral research at the California Institute of Technology before joining the faculty at the Harvard University School of Public Health. He became a professor at Stanford in 1989. ¶