Editors

Peter Drotman started his career at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer. Before arriving at CDC, he served in the WHO Smallpox Eradication Programme, assisting in the successful effort to eradicate variola major from Bangladesh. At CDC, he was a founding scientist in the National Center for Environmental Health and later served as assistant director for Public Health and Science, Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention. He has a broad background in clinical practice, public health, infectious diseases, and epidemiologic science and holds appointments as clinical assistant professor in the Departments of Medicine and Family and Preventive Medicine, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Drotman was inducted into the UCLA School of Public Health Alumni Hall of Fame in 2010.

Matt Kuehnert most recently served as chief medical officer of a global nonprofit tissue bank, the Musculoskeletal Transplant Foundation, which processes human allografts for transplantation. Before 2017, he was an officer in the US Public Health Service assigned to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a medical epidemiologist. Starting in 1996 at CDC, he was an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer and staff member in the Hospital Infections Program, researching antimicrobial resistance and occupational infections in healthcare personnel. Later, he served in many infectious disease-related public health responses during his tenure at the agency, including anthrax, West Nile, monkey pox, Ebola virus, and Zika virus. As the founding director of the Office of Blood, Organ, and Other Tissue Safety, he helped establish national systems for blood transfusion-associated adverse events and transplant-transmitted diseases, and he led guidelines to better screen organ donors for HIV and Hepatitis C virus, which resulted in the use of nucleic acid amplification testing, an advanced laboratory method for detecting early infection. Completing undergraduate education at University of California San Diego, he received his medical degree from Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. He trained in internal medicine at Stanford University and University of California San Francisco, and in infectious diseases at Emory University. He is a Professor at the Hackensack School of Medicine in New Jersey.

Charles Benjamin (Ben) Beard earned a B.S. in 1980 at Auburn University, a M.S. in 1983 at the Louisiana State University School of Medicine, and a Ph.D. in 1987 at the University of Florida. He was a post-doctoral fellow and associate research scientist at the Yale University School of Medicine from 1987 to 1991. In 1991, he joined CDC's Division of Parasitic Diseases. In 2003 he moved to CDC's Division of Vector-Borne Diseases in Fort Collins, CO to serve as Chief of the Bacterial Diseases Branch and currently as the Deputy Division Director. Ben's scientific career has focused on the prevention and control of vector-borne diseases, in domestic and global arenas. He has published over 140 scientific papers, books, and book chapters collectively. He is an Associate Editor for Emerging Infectious Diseases and past president of the Society for Vector Ecology and served as Deputy Incident Manager for CDC's Zika virus outbreak response.

Ermias D. Belay is an Associate Director for Epidemiologic Science for the Division of High-Consequence Pathogens and Pathology, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Atlanta, Georgia, USA. He helped establish various aspects of CDC's nationwide prion disease surveillance programs, and directs CJD case and cluster investigations related to its iatrogenic transmission and the zoonotic transmission of prion diseases. Dr. Belay’s career at CDC has also included working on influenza epidemiology, coordination of surveillance programs for Kawasaki syndrome and Reye syndrome, outbreak investigations of these diseases, and studies involving the identification of possible etiologic agents of Kawasaki syndrome. His area of interest extends to poxviruses, hemorrhagic fever viruses, and zoonotic transmission of infectious diseases. Dr. Belay was trained as a medical doctor and epidemiologist and first joined CDC in 1994 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer.

Richard Bradbury is Associate Professor of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at James Cook University in Townsville, North Queensland, Australia. His areas of interest include diagnostics and epidemiology in medical parasitology and zoonoses and other infectious diseases relevant to the tropics and sub-tropics. Richard’s career has involved both academic and diagnostic medical laboratory positions in Australia, West Africa, Europe, and the United States of America. He is the former Team Lead of the Parasitic Diseases Diagnostic Reference Laboratory at the CDC in the United States. His research thus far has spanned several broad areas, including strongyloidiasis, soil transmitted helminths, giardiasis and cryptosporidiosis, tickborne diseases, arboviruses, and several emerging parasitic pathogens. Richard is a member of World Health Organisation (WHO) technical advisory groups on surveillance for neglected tropical diseases and strongyloidiasis. Professor Bradbury has published over 100 scientific papers and over 30 textbook chapters, and is a recipient of the Australian Society for Microbiology Lyn Gilbert award for services to Clinical Microbiology nationally and internationally.

Byron Breedlove previously worked in the Office of the Associate Director for Policy as a senior communications specialist. Before that, he served in the same capacity with the Office of Strategy and Innovation, arriving there from a lengthy detail performing communications and web content management for CDC’s Future’s Initiative. From 1998–2005, Byron worked in the Financial Management Office, where he was managing editor and developer for CDC’s Chief Financial Officer’s Annual Reports, the first consolidated CDC-wide annual document that provided an overview of prior-year accomplishments and audited financial statements. He spent the first 13 years of his CDC career in NCCDPHP, serving as managing editor of Chronic Disease Notes & Reports, editing technical and scientific manuscripts, coordinating Web clearances, working in varying capacities with the team that developed Physical Activity and Health: A Report of the Surgeon General, and developing and overseeing digital prepress (desktop publishing) capabilities within NCCDPHP.

Before joining CDC, Byron was copy editor and special publications director for American Health Consultants, where he oversaw the publication of seven books and the start-up of a journal. His earlier career focused on teaching, including stints as a middle school teacher, a college instructor, and an ESL instructor. He is a past president of the Southeast Chapter of the American Medical Writers Association.

Corrie Brown is a professor in the Department of Pathology at the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine. Her interests include pathogenesis of infectious diseases, and building animal health infrastructure in the developing world. She has worked on animal health projects in over 30 countries. Prior to joining the University of Georgia she spent 10 years at the Plum Island Animal Disease Center where her focus was on transboundary animal diseases. She serves on numerous government and industry panels as well as several editorial boards.

Benjamin Cowling joined the School of Public Health (SPH) at HKU in 2004. Prior to moving to Hong Kong, he graduated with a PhD in medical statistics at the University of Warwick (UK) in 2003, and spent a year as a postdoc at Imperial College London (UK). Professor Cowling has been the Head of the Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics since 2013. He is responsible for teaching the introductory module in epidemiology on the MPH curriculum, and is the chairman of the Departmental Research Postgraduate Committee. Professor Cowling is co-director of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Control at HKU SPH.

Professor Cowling’s primary research focus is in infectious disease epidemiology. In recent years, he has designed and implemented large field studies of influenza transmission in the community and the effectiveness and impact of control measures, including large vaccine trials. His latest research has focused on the modes of respiratory virus transmission, influenza vaccination effectiveness, and the link between individual immunity and population immunity to infections.

Professor Cowling is a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society and a Fellow of the UK Faculty of Public Health. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses, an Associate Editor of Emerging Infectious Diseases, a Section Editor of PLOS ONE, and a founding editor of PLOS Currents: Outbreaks.

Michel Drancourt is a Professor of Microbiology in Marseille's Medical School, Mediterrannée University and the Director of Reseach Federative Institute on Microbiology, Marseille. Michel Drancourt's interests include advanced laboratory tools for the detection and identification of organisms. He has special expertise in the fields of paleomicrobiology, emerging pathogens, mycobacteria and plague. He serves on national and international review panels, is a Deputy Editor-in-Chief for Clinical Microbiology and Infection, and is a regular or intermittent reviewer for 10 scientific journals.

Paul Effler received a Doctorate in Medicine from the University of California and a Master of Public Health degree from the University of Hawaii. After completing a residency in Public Health and Preventive Medicine, he served as an Officer in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at CDC and worked as a consultant to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the World Health Organization. For more than a decade he was the State Epidemiologist for Hawaii where he oversaw disease surveillance activities and directed the public health response to outbreaks of SARS, dengue fever, leptospirosis, murine typhus, measles, hepatitis A, and Escherichia coli O157. In 2008 he moved to Western Australia where he served as the State Human Epidemic Controller during the 2009 influenza pandemic; he currently manages WA's immunization program and sees patients at a sexual health clinic.

Anthony (Tony) Fiore, MD, MPH, is a medical epidemiologist and infectious diseases physician. From 2015 through September 2021, he was Chief of the Epidemiology Research and Innovations Branch, Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, leading projects aimed at preventing or reducing healthcare-associated infections and sepsis. Dr. Fiore was also division lead on discussions with WHO, Pharma, and CDC advisory committees about the potential impact of vaccines on antibiotic resistance and antibiotic stewardship. Since coming to CDC in 1995 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) officer, he worked on respiratory diseases, viral hepatitis, malaria and other parasitic diseases, and influenza, as well as emergency responses for anthrax, hurricanes, cholera in Haiti, SARS, and COVID-19. He also previously served as CDC liaison to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) Influenza Working Group and led the development of expanded seasonal vaccine, pandemic vaccine recommendations. and antiviral treatment guidance during 2006−2010.

David Freedman is Professor Emeritus of Infectious Diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He currently serves as President-Elect of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. He is a founding director of the GeoSentinel Surveillance Network which monitors trends in morbidity in travelers in migrants at 65 sentinel sites on 6 continents. Trained in infectious diseases, clinical tropical medicine, and immunoparasitology, he founded and teaches in the Gorgas Course in Clinical Tropical Medicine in Lima, Peru. He serves on the Roster of Experts for the International Health Regulations of the World Health Organization and was a member of the WHO Expert Committee on Zika.  He is a co-author of the Infectious Diseases Society of America Clinical Practice Guidelines on Travel Medicine and is co-editor of the textbook, Travel Medicine. He is a Section Editor of the Journal of Travel Medicine and was Chair, Expert Advisory Panel on Parasitic Disease Therapy, United States Pharmacopeia (USP) from 1995–2000.

Isaac Fung is an associate professor of epidemiology at Georgia Southern University Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health. His research expertise includes infectious disease epidemiology, digital health, pandemic preparedness and emergency responses. Isaac currently serves on the editorial boards of Emerging Infectious Diseases and Public Health Reports. In 2011-13, Isaac served as a CDC Steven M. Teutsch Prevention Effectiveness Fellow at the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID) Division of Preparedness and Emerging Infections (DPEI).

Peter Gerner-Smidt is a consultant in food safety microbiology, a Danish MD with specialization in clinical microbiology. He is a member of the WHO INFOSAN Advisory Board. Until 2020, he was heading the Enteric Diseases Laboratory Branch in the Division for Foodborne, Waterborne and Environmental Diseases at CDC. He was the chairman of the PulseNet International Steering committee. Before moving to the United States in 2004, he was the Head of the Danish Reference Centre for Enteric Pathogens and Listeria at Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen from 1995- 2004. He was a member of the coordinating group for the Danish Zoonosis Centre and Danish representative in EnterNet, the European network for surveillance of Salmonella, VTEC and Campylobacter 1995–2004 serving on the steering committee from 2001–2004. His research interests are the epidemiology, including subtyping, and identification of foodborne, zoonotic and enteric bacterial pathogens.

Stephen Hadler is currently Deputy Director, Division of Bacterial Diseases, National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. He graduated from New York University Medical School and completed residency and served as Chief Resident in Internal Medicine at Kings County/Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York. Subsequently he began a 34 year career as a medical epidemiologist, primarily at CDC Atlanta. He worked for 12 years in Hepatitis Division; for 7 years with National Immunization Program, serving as Chief, Epidemiology and Surveillance Division; and for 8 years with Global Immunization Division, through May 2005, including 2 ½ years seconded to WHO Pakistan for polio eradication. From May 2005 – Dec 2008, he worked in WHO China office, focusing on hepatitis B prevention (China GAVI project) and introduction of new vaccines. Dr. Hadler rejoined CDC in March 2009 as Deputy Director, Division of Bacterial Diseases. Dr. Hadler is Board certified in Internal Medicine. He has published over 120 scientific articles and book chapters. He is recipient of CDCs Philip R. Horne Award for immunization, and the Public Health Service Distinguished Service Medal. He also served as Executive Secretary for the US Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). Strongest interests include prevention of diseases through vaccination, both in the U.S. and globally.

Shawn Lockhart earned his BS from Bellarmine University (1988) and his PhD from the University of Kentucky (1993).  He was a postdoc and an Assistant research scientist at the University of Iowa before a clinical microbiology fellowship at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics.  He joined the Mycotic Diseases Branch at the CDC as a Team Lead in 2008 and received board certification in clinical microbiology in 2010 (ABMM).  He is currently the Senior Clinical Laboratory Advisor for the Mycotic Diseases Branch and his emphasis is on clinical mycology, antifungal resistance, and laboratory capacity building. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and has authored or coauthored over 250 manuscripts and book chapters and his work has been cited almost 20,000 times.  He is currently co-authoring the 7^th edition of Larone’s Medically Important Fungi.

Nina Marano trained in veterinary medicine at the University of Georgia and in public health at Emory University. She is board certified by the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine. Since 1998 Dr. Marano has been a medical epidemiologist at CDC, first with the Foodborne and Diarrheal Diseases Branch working on antimicrobial resistance, and then with the Meningitis and Special Pathogens Branch as the principal investigator for the Anthrax Vaccine Research Program. From 2004-2006, to help CDC better respond to zoonotic disease outbreaks, Dr Marano served as CDC's veterinary public health liaison to forge new partnerships with the veterinary medical community, resulting in collaborations with the World Organization for Animal Health, the National Wildlife Health Center and the development of a CDC-sponsored research program on influenza at the human-animal interface. In June 2006, she joined the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine, first as the branch chief for the Travelers' Health and Animal Importation Branch. In July 2009, she became the branch chief for the Quarantine and Border Health Services Branch, and in 2015 became the branch chief of the Immigrant Refugee and Migrant Health Branch. Her interests include the impact of globalization on the translocation of infectious diseases across international borders. Dr Marano retired from CDC in December 2021.

Martin Meltzer is senior health economist and distinguished consultant, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). His research interests include cost-benefit and cost-effectiveness analyses of health interventions and policy guidelines for use of health technologies, such as vaccines. Much of his work is multidisciplinary and has included modeling of potential responses to smallpox as a bioterrorist weapon; evaluating the cost effectiveness of Lyme disease and hepatitis A vaccination; assessing the economic impact of infectious diseases, from pandemic influenza to dengue; and modeling of raccoon rabies control by oral vaccine. He is involvement in the response to the 2009 influenza pandemic included providing frequent updates of estimates of impact of the pandemic and estimating the effectiveness of a number of different interventions. Dr. Meltzer has published more than 100 publications and has received many honors and awards, among them, CDC's Charles C. Shepard award and the James H. Nakano citation.

David Morens, medical historian and professor, University of Hawaii School of Medicine, since 1982, took academic leave of absence in 1999 to work at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Morens' research interests include viral disease pathogenesis, epidemiology, and the relationship between biomedical research and public health.

Glenn Morris is Director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute (EPI) at the University of Florida, Gainesville, where he is also a Professor of Medicine specializing in Infectious Diseases. He received his MD and a master's degree in public health and tropical medicine from Tulane; his residency training was at University of Texas Southwestern (Dallas) and Emory University, with service as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. He is board certified in internal medicine and infectious diseases. From 2000–2007 he served as Chairman of the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) School of Medicine, and from 2005–2007 was interim dean of the UMB School of Public Health. Dr. Morris has authored over 60 textbook chapters and symposium proceedings and over 200 articles in peer-reviewed journals. He has had continuous federal grant funding since 1984; his scholarly contributions were recognized by election to the American Society for Clinical Investigation in 1996. In 2005, he was awarded the James D. Bruce Memorial Award by the American College of Physicians for Distinguished Contributions in Preventive Medicine, in recognition of his work in food safety. He has served on five National Academy of Sciences expert committees dealing with food safety, and currently serves on the Institute of Medicine's Food and Nutrition Board. He maintains an active research program in emerging pathogens and enteric diseases.

Patrice Nordmann is the Head of the Molecular Microbiology Unit, Department of Medicine, University of Fribourg (Switzerland), serves as the Chief of the Department of Bacteriology-Virology at the Hospital Bicêtre, and Professor in Clinical Microbiology at the South-Paris Medical School (South-Paris University). He also founded a research unit "Emerging Antibiotic Resistances“ at the Bicêtre hospital- South-Paris Medical School in 1997 (becoming INSERM Unit 914 in 2008). Patrice Nordmann's interests include genetics, biochemistry, and epidemiology of emerging resistance to antibiotics, mostly in Gram negative organisms. He serves on many international committees and review panels and is on the editorial board of several journals including Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.

Johann Pitout is a Professor at the Cummings Medical School, University of Calgary and Medical Microbiologist at Calgary Laboratory Services, Alberta, Canada. His main research interests are resistance to antimicrobial agents among Gram-negative bacteria especially the laboratory detection, characterization, molecular epidemiology and evolution of bacteria with newer b-lactamases such as AmpC, Extended-spectrum b-lactamases and Carbapenemases. He has also been involved in population-based surveillance studies and the role of high risk clones and mobile genetic elements (such as plasmids) among bacteria producing these newer types of b-lactamases.

Didier Raoult is a professor in microbiology in Marseille Medical School and the director of the Research Unit in Infectious and Tropical Emerging Diseases (URMITE) which is associated with Aix-Marseille University, French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and French Institute of Research and Development (IRD). He is also the director of the National Reference Center on intracellular bacteria such as Rickettsia, Coxiella, Bartonella, and Tropheryma whipplei. He has published more than 1,400 publications (h-index: 79). He was president of the Université de la Méditerranée and advisor to the French Ministry of Health on infectious diseases and bioterrorism. He has managed with his team the discovery or the additional description of more than 90 pathogenic bacteria for humans, as well as the discovery of the largest viruses known in the world. He has also cultured T. whipplei and highlighted that the Whipple's disease bacterium was actually a common cause of gastroenteritis in the child. His research interests include microbiogenomic, probiotics and paleomicrobiology. He has received the INSERM Grand Award in 2010.

Pierre Rollin started his career at the Pasteur Institute, Paris, working on rabies and viral hemorrhagic fevers in conjunction with overseas Pasteur Institutes. After serving a National Research Council fellowship at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, he joined the Special Pathogens Branch, Division of Viral and Rickettsial Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He was directly involved in the discovery, characterization, and field response to a number of new and emerging diseases (such as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, Lassa fever, Marburg hemorrhagic fever, Sabia virus infection, hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, Rift Valley fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, Nipah encephalitis, and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), their diagnosis in the laboratory and development of serologic tests, the management of outbreaks in the field (public health response, patient management, safety, diagnosis in the field, epidemiology, reservoir search), and the pathogenesis of disease in human and animal models. His research interests concern emerging zoonotic and arthropod borne infectious diseases with emphasis on public health response and preparedness. At the end of January 2019 Pierre Rollin retired  from the CDC.

Frederic Shaw retired in 2019 as the editor in chief of the journal, Public Health Reports. He began his public health career at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer and staff epidemiologist in CDC’s Hepatitis Branch. Subsequently, he served as the state epidemiologist in his home state of New Hampshire, assistant health commissioner at the Texas Department of Health, staff counsel in the U.S. Senate, and private consultant in Washington, DC. After returning to CDC in 2001, he served in a variety of positions in infectious disease control, public health surveillance, public health law, and as editor in chief of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. He holds doctoral degrees in medicine and law, board certifications in internal medicine and preventive medicine, and membership in the New Hampshire state bar. He is an adjunct professor at the Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, where he teaches the annual course in public health law. In recent years, his interests have centered on medical editing and publishing.

Neil Vora, MD, is a policy fellow at Conservation International where he leads its efforts on pandemic prevention. He served for nearly a decade with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), including as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer and a Commander in the US Public Health Service. Neil deployed for CDC to Liberia in 2014 and to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2019 to assist in the responses to the two largest Ebola outbreaks ever. He also led the investigation of a newly discovered smallpox-like virus in the country of Georgia in 2013. From 2020-2021, Neil developed and led New York City's COVID-19 contact tracing program, overseeing a team of over 3,000 people. He is an Associate Editor at CDC's Emerging Infectious Diseases journal, an Adjunct Professor of Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases at Columbia University, and a Presidential Leadership Scholar. He still sees patients in a public tuberculosis clinic in New York City. Outside of work, Neil loves to spend time with his rescue pets and to train in Brazilian jiu jitsu.

David Walker is head of the Center for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Pathology, and Carmage and Martha Walls Distinguished University Chair in Tropical Diseases at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. He began his scientific career at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where he investigated Lassa fever pathogenesis in the original biosafety level 4 laboratory. While on the University of North Carolina faculty, he became an established National Institutes of Health–funded investigator of rickettsioses, conducted clinical studies of Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and initiated a lifelong commitment as an educator. In the past two decades, he has pursued the study of ehrlichioses, participating in the discovery of human infections with Anaplasma phagocytophilum. He has devoted particular effort to technology transfer and clinical and epidemiologic investigations in China, Sicily, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, and Cameroon. In 1992, he elucidated the inhalational route of infection of 41 autopsied cases of anthrax in the 1979 Sverdlovsk event and continues to analyze pathology and causes of death in these cases. He is Principal Investigator of the NIH Western Regional Center of Excellence in Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases, a $105 million grant for the period 2003–2014. His research program focuses on mechanisms of immunity in animal models of rickettsioses, monocytotropic ehrlichioses, and scrub typhus.

Scott Weese is a veterinary internist with a focus on infectious diseases. He is a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine, a Professor at the Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph and the University of Guelph Centre for Public Health and Zoonoses. He is also Chief of Infection Control at the Ontario Veterinary College Teaching Hospital and holds a Canada Research Chair in zoonotic diseases. HIs research and clinical interests span a range of infectious disease topics in companion animals, food animals and wildlife, with a focus on zoonotic diseases, antimicrobial resistance, antimicrobial stewardship and emerging pathogens.

Charles Henry (Charlie) Calisher is Professor Emeritus at the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, where he was previously Professor of Microbiology, Arthropod-borne and Infectious Diseases Laboratory, Department of Microbiology. Before that, he was employed at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as Chief of the Arbovirus Reference Branch, and he later served as Director of the Division of Vector-Borne Infectious Diseases (Atlanta) and Assistant Director for International Programs and Director, W.H.O. Collaborating Centre for Arbovirus Reference and Research (Fort Collins). Dr. Calisher has focused on studies of arboviruses, bat-borne viruses, and rodent-borne viruses, publishing more than 400 peer-reviewed scientific paper, book chapters, and books. He has served on a wide variety of numerous federal, international, and other committees and panels, mostly focused on laboratory and field diagnostics.

Joseph McDade, founding editor of Emerging Infectious Diseases spent most of his career at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as research microbiologist and eventually as deputy director, National Center for Infectious Diseases. Author of more than 100 scientific articles, Dr. McDade is best known for isolating and identifying Legionella pneumophila, the bacterium that causes Legionnaires' disease; for identifying the cause of ehrlichiosis, an emerging tickborne illness; and for directing research on Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Q fever, and typhus.