The University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health has appointed Dr. Charles R. Rinaldo Jr. as chairman of the school’s Department of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology. Rinaldo currently serves as director of the Pittsburgh site of the national Multi-Center AIDS Cohort Study, known locally as the Pitt Men’s Study.
Rinaldo has been a member of the department of Pathology at the University of Pittsburgh since 1978 and has dedicated his career to uncovering the cellular basis of HIV infection and immunity, charting the epidemiology of AIDS and examining T-cell and dendritic cell responses to HIV and herpes viruses.
“Dr. Rinaldo has been involved in HIV/AIDS research since the beginning of the epidemic,” said Dr. Donald R. Mattison, dean of Pitt’s Graduate School of Public Health. “His work has enhanced our collective knowledge and understanding of HIV infection and has enabled the University of Pittsburgh to become a leader in infectious diseases research.”
Rinaldo completed his undergraduate degree at Syracuse University and, after receiving his doctorate in 1973 from the University of Utah, conducted postdoctoral research at Massachusetts General Hospital.
In addition to his newly-appointed chairmanship of the Infectious Diseases and Microbiology Department, Rinaldo’s academic duties include serving as a professor of pathology in Pitt’s School of Medicine, the assistant director of Clinical Microbiology at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the director of the AIDS-Related Malignancy Program at University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute.
“As the chairman of the Infectious Diseases and Microbiology Department, I have been given the unique opportunity to shape and enhance the research programs on infectious diseases at the University of Pittsburgh,” Rinaldo said. “By strengthening and mobilizing the network of researchers from various schools and departments throughout the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, we are aggressively confronting AIDS and other emerging infectious diseases.”
This article originally appeared in Pittsburgh’s Out. This article is preserved as a part of the Q Archives project. Please consider donating to help preserve Pittsburgh’s Queer history.
