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​International Advisory Committee

The Sanford F. Kuvin Center for the Study of Infectious and Tropical Diseases at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem was established in 1976 and is a leader in vector-borne research. Kuvin Center scientists combine biochemistry, entomology, molecular biology, genetics and immunology to investigate prevalent tropical and infectious diseases, including malaria, leishmaniasis, trypanosomiasis, and helminthic diseases. The mission of the Kuvin Center is to advance research in infectious and tropical diseases and to promote peace through cooperative science. The International Advisory Committee is responsible for stewardship of the Kuvin Center for the Study of Infectious and Tropical Diseases. The Committee does not manage the Center’s day-to-day activities; rather, the Committee serves to promote the mission of the Kuvin Center.
Jeffrey Kuvin
Jeffrey Kuvin (Chair) is Chief of Cardiovascular Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and Professor of Medicine at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Jeff received his undergraduate degree in Near East / North African Studies from the University of Michigan in 1988 and was a member of the varsity swimming team. He won a swimming silver medal at the 1985 World Maccabiah Games. He graduated from Emory University School of Medicine in 1992 and trained in internal medicine and cardiovascular diseases at Tufts Medical Center. While an attending cardiologist at Tufts, Jeff was the Director of Education and Fellowship Training, Associate Chief of Cardiology, and Associate Chief Medical Officer for Graduate Medical Education. He presently serves as the Chair of Education for the American College of Cardiology and is the Chair of the ACC Annual Scientific Sessions. Jeff is the son of Sanford and Gabrielle Kuvin, founders of the Kuvin Center, and lives in Lyme, New Hampshire with his wife and two children.
John Beier
John C. Beier, Sc.D., is Professor and Director of the Division of Environment and Public Health in the Department of Public Health Sciences. Dr. Beier’s research career is committed to the ecology and control of vector-borne diseases, including malaria, dengue, Zika, other arboviruses, and leishmaniasis. With a strong network of international collaborators and University of Miami faculty and students from several departments and centers, interdisciplinary research is being conducted on vector species of mosquitoes and sand flies, pathogen transmission dynamics, determinants of human risk, novel vector control methods, and innovative integrated vector management strategies for disease control. He has 300 publications. His current research is supported by an NIH grants on the ecology and behavior of African malaria vectors and a CDC grant for vector-borne diseases in southeastern U.S. He is also involved with research on new approaches for malaria and dengue vector control. He was ranked by BiomedExperts #1 for Anopheles mosquitoes and #2 for Disease Vectors. Dr. Beier teaches Ecology and Control of Vector-Borne Diseases, and in 2013 won the Best Teacher award. In external activities, he is an Editor for Acta Tropica, a past member of the World Health Organization Vector Control Advisory Group, past Chairman of review committee for the Department of Defense Military Infectious Disease Research program for Vector Biology, and past Chairman of the National Institutes of Health study panel on Vector Biology.
Anne Blumberg
Anne Blumberg worked for the Division of Health Care Policy and Finance in Massachusetts and as a program coordinator in clinical trials at Merck and Company in New Jersey. She currently serves on the Presidential Advisory Board of the Baruch S. Blumberg Institute. Anne has a degree in physical anthropology from Barnard College and an MPH from Boston University School of Public Health. She lives in Newton, Massachusetts with her husband and two children.
 
Dana Gershon
Dana Gershon is an attorney with a private practice that specializes in employment law. She counsels clients on all aspects of employment relationships, including federal and state anti-discrimination laws, wage and hour laws, and employee non-competition agreements. She represents numerous clients in the healthcare industry, independently and through an affiliation with Ankner & Levy, PC. Prior to starting her own practice, Dana worked at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C. She also served as Manager of the Litigation Department at Goodwin Proctor, LLP, and taught legal research, writing and oral advocacy at Boston University School of Law. Dana received her J.D. from Columbia University School of Law, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar. She received her B.A. from Cornell University, magna cum laude, and was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society. She is a member of the Bars of Massachusetts and New York. Dana is a past President of the Board of Trustees of the Rashi School in Dedham, MA and a current trustee there. She is a trustee of the Boston Jewish Community Relations Council, and on the Council at Temple Israel in Boston. Dana co-chaired Combined Jewish Philanthropy’s Boston-Haifa Connection and was instrumental in the founding of the Parents and the Center Program in Haifa, Israel. Dana is also on the Board of Advisors of the New England Center for Children in Southborough, MA.
Oren Harman
Oren Harman is the Chair of the Graduate Program in Science, Technology and Society at Bar Ilan University. He was trained in history and biology at the Hebrew University, Oxford, and Harvard, and is a historian of science and a writer. He teaches evolutionary theory, the interplay between scientific, social, and philosophical thought, and writing. His books include The Man Who Invented the Chromosome (Harvard, 2004), Rebels, Mavericks and Heretics in Biology [with Michael Dietrich] (Yale, 2008), Outsider Scientists [with Michael Dietrich] (Chicago, 2013), Dreamers, Visionaries and Revolutionar-ies in the Life Sciences (Chicago, 2018), and The Price of Altruism (W.W. Norton, 2010) which won the 2010 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Best Book of the Year in Science and Technology, was nominated for the Pulitzer prize, and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Oren was a member of the Young Israeli Academy of Sciences, has been a frequent contributor to The New Republic and Haaretz Magazine, and is the co-creator of the Israeli Oscar-nominated documentary series "Did Herzl Really Say That?" His work has been featured in The New York Times, The London Times, Nature, Science, The Economist, Forbes, New Scientist, Scientific American, Times Higher Educa-tion, Discover, The Huffington Post, RADIOLAB and many others. In 2015, Oren was awarded the Excellence in Teaching Award by his university. His next book,Evolutions: Fifteen Myths that Explain Our World is forthcoming from Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2018. He grew up in Jerusalem and New York City, and lives with his wife and two children in Tel Aviv.
Stephen Hoffman
Stephen Hoffman received his medical degree from Cornell, diploma in tropical medicine and hygiene at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and completed residency training in family practice at the University of California, San Diego. He is the former Director of the Malaria Program at the Naval Medical Research Center, Past President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, and Member of the National Academy of Medicine. He is a highly cited author and has contributed significantly to our understanding of malaria, typhoid fever and other tropical infectious. He is presently the Chief Executive and Scientific Officer of Sanaria, a biotechnology company focused on developing vaccines to protect against malaria.
 
Marvin Konstam
Marvin Konstam directs the Tufts Medical Center CardioVascular Center, which oversees the Divisions of Cardiology, Cardiac Surgery, Vascular Surgery, and Interventional Cardiology. He served as Chief of Cardiology at Tufts from 1995-2007. His special area of clinical, academic, and research interest is heart failure, with a focus on developing new therapies for this condition. He is a member of the Board of Trustees at Tufts Medical Center. . Marv previously served as Chair of the Academic Cardiology Council of the American College of Cardiology and as President of the Heart Failure Society of America. He co-founded Cardiovascular Clinical Science Foundation (CCSF), a non-profit contract research organization conducting clinical trials in collaboration with the pharmaceutical and medical device industries. He currently serves as the Board Chair and Chief Scientific Officer of CCSF. Among additional prior roles, he has served as the Chief Medical Officer of Orqis Medical, a start-up cardiovascular medical device company; a member of the Cardiovascular and Renal Advisory Committee of the Food and Drug Administration (he continues to serve on FDA Advisory Committees on an ad hoc basis); and a consultant to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, as a member of the Medicare Coverage Advisory Committee and in their programs for improving quality of care in heart failure. Marv received both his undergraduate and medical degrees from Columbia University and performed his post-doctoral training in Internal Medicine and Cardiology at the Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women’s Hospitals.
Yair Lootsteen
Yair Lootsteen is Deputy Chair of the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism - the Israeli Reform Movement, charged with overseeing that organization's financial affairs. He has been on the IMPJ Board since 2013. Born in London, England, Yair grew up in Toronto, Ontario. He made aliyah to Israel in 1979 and has since resided in Jerusalem. A lawyer, Yair served in the IDF's Military Advocate General Corps for 23 years, completing his term of duty in 2007 with the rank of Colonel. He held several challenging positions during his military career, the last being that of the Legal Advisor to the IDF in Judea and Samaria. Since completing his regular IDF service, Yair has invested much of his time on issues relating to Jewish pluralism in Israel, particularly in Jerusalem. From 2010 to 2013 he served as president of Kehilat Kol Haneshama, Jerusalem's largest Reform synagogue and continues to be an active member of that synagogue's board. A member of the Israel team of ARZENU – the International Federation of Reform and Progressive Religious Zionists, Yair is Co-Chair of the World Zionist Organization's Standing Committee on Budget and Finance. He is also a regular columnist for the Canadian Jewish News. Yair is married to Hanna and they have two children, Naomi and Natan.
Andrew Wetenhall
Andrew Wetenhall is the Co-Head of Basic Materials-Americas in the Investment Banking Division of Morgan Stanley. He advises companies globally in basic materials and natural resources industries on mergers, acquisitions and major capital raising initiatives. He works with clients around the world, including in the Americas, Europe, Russia, the Middle East, and China, and has acted on behalf of industry leaders such as Weyerhaeuser, LyondellBasell, Peabody, Phelps Dodge and FairmountSantrol, among many others. Andrew serves as a lead governor of the Board of Governors of the Canadian Football League as well as on the board of directors of the Montreal Alouettes Football Club. He serves as director of Plusgrade, a private software company focused on the travel industry. Andrew graduated with a bachelor of arts from Vanderbilt University and lives in New York with his wife and three children.
 
Virginia (Ginny) Wise
Virginia (Ginny) Wise is Senior Vice President of Advancement at Tulane University. With over 25 years of professional development experience, Ginny spent her early career at Harvard University where she held positions of increasing responsibility at the College, Business School and Divinity School. Ginny received her undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and a Masters of Education from Harvard University. Ginny has also been active in Jewish communal life. In Boston, she served on the board of Combined Jewish Philanthropies, Jewish Family and Children’s Service, Jewish Big Brother Big Sister, and as board chair of InterfaithFamily.com. She received the Boston Young Leadership Award in 2002. In New Orleans, she completed the Lemann-Stern Leadership program and has served on the Jewish Federation Board. She is currently Marketing Chair for the Jewish Community Center. Nationally, she served on the JFNA Young Leadership Cabinet. She is also involved at Dartmouth College where she currently sits on the Dartmouth College Fund Executive Committee. Having also served Dartmouth as a member of the Alumni Council, as well as Class President and Club President, she is a past winner of the Young Alumni Distinguished Service Award. In 2010, Ginny moved back to her hometown of New Orleans with her husband and three sons.
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