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Tim Manser, Ph.D., has been named chair of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia.

Dr. Manser, professor of microbiology and immunology at Jefferson Medical College, has been leader of the Immunology Program at Jefferson’s Kimmel Cancer Center since 2000 and director of its Training Program in Developmental Immunology since 1996.

Dr. Manser’s research is aimed at understanding how the activity of B lymphocytes, the white blood cells that produce antibodies, contributes to human health and disease.  Normally, these cells help fight viral and bacterial infections. When the cells go awry, autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus (lupus) and B lymphocyte cancers such as chronic lymphocytic leukemia can result. Dr. Manser hopes to discover the key genes involved in regulating B lymphocyte activity, and how changing the expression of these genes contributes to autoimmune disease and cancer – perhaps ultimately leading to more effective vaccines and therapies for infectious diseases, as well as new diagnostic tests and therapies for autoimmune diseases and B lymphocyte cancers.

“Dr. Manser is an outstanding choice to be the new chair of microbiology and immunology,” says Thomas J. Nasca, M.D., dean of Jefferson Medical College. “His extensive experience as a researcher and teacher will enable him to provide strong leadership in the department.”

Dr. Manser was an assistant professor of molecular biology at Princeton University from 1985 to 1991, when he came to Jefferson. He was associate professor of microbiology and immunology at Jefferson Medical College from 1991 to 1997, and was a visiting member of the Basel Institute for Immunology in Basel, Switzerland from 1997 to 1998.

Dr. Manser received a bachelor of arts degree in biology from the University of California, San Diego in 1977, graduating summa cum laude, and a Ph. D. in biology in 1982 from the University of Utah. He was a postdoctoral fellow in immunology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1982 to 1985.
He has received numerous honors and awards for his work, including the Gowar Champion Award Postdoctoral Fellowship of the Damon Runyon-Walter Winchell Cancer Fund, an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellowship, a Medical Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship, and the National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award. He was a Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences.

He has also been a frequent lecturer at national and international professional workshops, meetings and conferences. He is the author or co-author of more than 80 peer-reviewed publications, reviews and book chapters. He has published widely in journals such as the Journal of Immunology, Nature Immunology, Cell and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. His research is supported by the National Institutes of Health as well as the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

In addition to serving as an editorial board member of BMC Immunology, he is a past advisory editor of the Journal of Experimental Medicine and a past section editor of the Journal of Immunology. He served as a permanent member of the NIH Experimental Immunology Study Section from 1995 to 1999. Dr. Manser is also a member of the American Association of Immunologists.