By: Anke A. Ehrhardt, Ph.D., HIV Center Director

At the end of each calendar year, we spend some time reviewing our progress over the past year, and charting our course for the next year. In 2009, we completed our 22nd year and also successfully carried out the second year of our latest renewal, focused on the theme of “Meeting the Challenges of Global AIDS at the Intersection of Gender, Sexuality, and Mental Health.” This most recent funding period marked the fifth time that the HIV Center has been renewed by NIMH, making the Center one of the oldest and most productive continuously funded AIDS research centers in the United States.

In this column, I would like to provide an overview on our major recent accomplishments and activities, as well as continuing priority areas for the forthcoming year. In particular, I would like to highlight four key themes: 1) multidisciplinary collaboration; 2) innovation and advancement of the field; 3) global perspectives; and 4) training of the next generation of leaders in HIV behavioral research and prevention.

Multidisciplinary collaboration: The HIV Center’s research program is supported by an infrastructure of six Cores, and we collaborate with nine Columbia University schools/departments, 39 outside institutions in the US, and 16 international institutions in 10 countries. Further, the HIV Center is the site of a variety of training activities that attract fellows, medical residents, graduate students, visiting scientists, and clinical providers from institutions in the US and abroad. Research at the HIV Center comprises approximately 40 individual studies involving more than 100 investigators from disciplines including psychology, psychiatry, public health, anthropology, sociology, and social work. 

This issue of the HIV Center E-Newsletter highlights one of our most exciting new partnerships, the EPIC Study with the International Center for AIDS Care and Treatment Programs (ICAP) at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health (Director: Wafaa El-Sadr, M.D., M.P.H.). 

Innovation and advancement of the field: Our investigators have continued to push the boundaries of existing science and undertaken work with a direct impact on public health. Over the past year, areas of innovation have included enhanced biomedical interventions such as HIV rapid testing, male circumcision, microbicides, and the use of antiretroviral therapy. We have also pushed forward the field on other issues such as the use of multimedia technologies for HIV prevention, the improvement of health systems and structures, reproductive decision-making among HIV-positive people, and critical but overlooked populations in the developing world including perinatally infected adolescents and men who have sex with men (MSM) in South African townships. 

In addition to the EPIC Study, this issue of the E-Newsletter also discusses the funding of a new study of HIV rapid-testing technologies (PI: Alex Carballo-Dieguez, Ph.D.) and the introduction of a new Master of Science degree program in Bioethics at the Columbia University School of Continuing Education (Director: Robert Klitzman, M.D.). In addition, the HIV Center's work on acute HIV infection, led by Robert Remien, Ph.D., is highlighted in this issue and was also profiled on the Columbia University website.

Global perspectives:  Our location in New York City, one of the epicenters of the AIDS epidemic in the developed world, has led to a long-standing commitment to the needs of local communities and populations. Our researchers continue to work throughout New York City and New York State, experiences which greatly inform our global undertakings. One excellent example is Dr. Remien's work on adherence and partner support (SMART Couples) in New York, which has been extended to South Africa (SMART-SA) and also informs the new EPIC Study in Lesotho.

Other examples would be the work of Theresa Exner, Ph.D., Joanne Mantell, Ph.D., and Susie Hoffman, Dr. P.H., on the female condom, and Milton Wainberg, M.D. on interventions with people who have serious mental illness. Likewise, knowledge gained in New York has recently been transferred to South Africa through the research of Claude Ann Mellins, Ph.D. and her team. Dr. Mellins' work with HIV-affected families and perinatally infected youths is profiled in a new feature introduced in this issue: the HIV Center Spotlight.

In all, our international portfolio has now reached 20 projects, in countries ranging from South Africa to Argentina and Vietnam to Brazil. A new overview of our growing global portfolio is now available on the HIV Center website.  The HIV Center has also begun to play an increasingly important role in strategic planning in the Middle East and Northern Africa (MENA) region. The HIV Center and the Program in Global Health at UCLA (Director: Thomas J. Coates, Ph.D.) have hosted a series of high level meetings in the MENA region, where intraregional collaborations with regard to HIV/AIDS have only rarely occurred. These meetings have begun to spur a new network in the MENA nations concerning issues of HIV and gender.

Training the next generation of leaders in HIV research and prevention: A corollary of our cutting edge research agenda has been the HIV Center’s role as a leader in innovative training and teaching programs. The HIV Center hosts a range of training activities that attract postdoctoral fellows, medical residents, graduate students, Fogarty Fellows, Visiting Scientists, community leaders, and clinical providers from institutions in the US and abroad. We are also home to the New York/New Jersey AIDS Education and Training Center (NY/NJ AETC) under the leadership of Francine Cournos, M.D.  

Since 1989, our Postdoctoral Program has graduated 59 Fellows. Notably, overall more than half (53%) of these have been women and over a third (36%) have been of ethnic minority background. Due to our increasingly effective recruitment strategies, three of this year’s four graduates were of minority background, as are all of the incoming cohort (N=4). Almost a quarter (22%) have been physicians. More than 70% hold academic positions and more than 80% are working in HIV-related fields. Currently, seven Fellows are in residence: six are members of ethnic minority groups, and four are women. In recognition of this success, the postdoctoral program was recently approved for renewal for another five year period beginning July 1, 2010 and will be under the leadership of Theo Sandfort, Ph.D. at that time.  Our four newest Fellows are introduced in this issue of the E-Newsletter.

Likewise, through the groundbreaking MAC AIDS Fund Leadership Initiative (MAFLI), co-sponsored by the HIV Center and the UCLA Program in Global Health, we have to date trained and mentored 34 Fellows, and are about to enroll 12 new Fellows in an intensive eight-week training program in South Africa on HIV prevention, gender equity, and leadership skills, in collaboration with the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) of South Africa.

Finally, I would like to draw your attention to our newly redesigned website, which was launched on World AIDS Day (December 1) 2009. The website now has improved functionality and design and, over the next several months,  will also bring new content and special features. I hope that you will take the time to learn more about all of these initiatives, and about the HIV Center in general, by visiting us at www.hivcenternyc.org.