Anne Moscona, M.D. named Director for Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases

We are pleased to announce that Anne Moscona, M.D is now the Director of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Weill Cornell Medical College. The Division is undergoing a renaissance, with an expanded faculty and new director.

In order to advance both the prevention and treatment of infectious diseases, physician-scientists in the Division will forward fundamental understanding of infectious diseases pathogenesis through basic science research while clinical investigators in the Division will carry out innovative patient-based research designed to apply medical advances to clinical practice on a daily basis. The clinical team provides consultative advice to the pediatric inpatient units; a program devoted to pediatric HIV/AIDS; a program focusing on preventing and treating infections in immunocompromised hosts; and a developing outpatient component. Since the scope of the new Division's initiative spans all aspects of pediatric infectious diseases, from basic research to clinical care and public health, the Divisional faculty will interact significantly with ongoing activities throughout Weill Cornell, and extending outwards collaboratively with the tri-institutional programs and Columbia.

Anne Moscona, M.D. is Professor of Pediatrics, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, and Vice Chair for Research of Pediatrics at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical College. She also serves as Attending Pediatrician at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and the NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Center for Children's Health. She received her bachelor's degree from Harvard College, her medical degree (M.D.) from Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons, and completed her internship, residency, and fellowship in infectious diseases at Mount Sinai Medical Center. She joined the faculty at Weill Cornell four years ago following 23 years at Mount Sinai where she was a Professor of Pediatrics, served as Division Chief of Pediatric Infectious Diseases and Vice Chair of Pediatrics for Research, Director of the Microbiology and Immunology course in the medical school, and Associate Director of the M.D./Ph.D. program in the Graduate School of Biological Sciences.

Dr. Moscona serves on several national grant review committees, including those at the National Institutes of Health, the March of Dimes and the Burroughs Wellcome Fund. Her honors include election to membership in the Society for Pediatric Research, the American Society of Clinical Investigation, and Fellowship in the American Academy of Microbiology.

She came to her interest in pediatrics and infectious diseases through a passion for improving health care for vulnerable children. For the last twenty years, along with caring for children with infectious diseases, Dr. Moscona has conducted basic research on respiratory viruses that cause serious childhood diseases and on newly emerging viruses that affect humans. The human parainfluenza viruses studied in the Moscona laboratory are an important cause of croup, pneumonia and infant bronchiolitis, major causes of disease and death in infants and in children under 5 years of age. The laboratory is best known for identifying critical roles of the viral receptor binding protein in activating the viral fusion process during infection. By identifying the mechanism of fusion activation, Dr. Moscona and her colleagues have identified potential targets for interfering with the viral entry process. For a group of related paramyxoviruses that have recently begun causing serious infections in humans, Hendra and Nipah viruses, she and her colleagues are working to dissect how the receptor-binding protein triggers the fusion and entry process, and have very recently identified small molecules that interfere with fusion and prevent entry of these pathogens into cells.

Dr. Moscona is dedicated to applying her discoveries to new strategies for antiviral drugs, for pediatric respiratory viruses and for emerging pathogens including influenza. Dr. Moscona has written on these topics for the New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal of Clinical Investigation, as well as for basic science journals including the Journal of Virology. Her research has been continuously funded by the NIH for over 20 years, and her projects are also supported by grants from The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and other sources.

For more information about Dr. Moscona's research program, please see
http://www.weillcornell.org/researcher/amoscona/index.html

For more information about the Department of Pediatrics, please see
http://www.cornellpediatrics.org/ser_div/infectious/index.html

About the Komansky Center for Children's Health
Our Children's Hospital is the only New York hospital to rank in all ten clinical specialties reported in the 2009 U.S.News & World Report "America's Best Children's Hospitals" issue. The Hospital also ranks among the top 10 nationally in four categories: Neonatal Care (#6), Heart and Heart Surgery (#6), Diabetes/Endocrine Disorders (#7) and Neurology & Neurosurgery (#7). The ranking accounts for NewYork-Presbyterian's two major centers for children's health care: NewYork-Presbyterian Phyllis and David Komansky Center for Children's Health and NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital. The Komansky Center is conveniently located in the Upper East Side in Manhattan between York Avenue and the East River.