The University of Vermont Graduate College has announced that Beth Kirkpatrick, M.D., professor and chair of microbiology and molecular genetics, has been named one of three 2021-2022 University Scholars. The University Scholars program recognizes distinguished UVM faculty members for sustained excellence in research, scholarship, and creative arts.

Kirkpatrick, who holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, is an attending physician at the UVM Medical Center. She began her career with research interests in enteric infections, mucosal immunology, and vaccines. In 2001, she launched the UVM Vaccine Testing Center, now comprised of a multi-disciplinary team researching candidate vaccines and vaccine immunology. With the goal of understanding and preventing infectious diseases around the globe (especially in low-income countries), this committed and growing team of investigators performs both investigator-initiated and industry-supported phase I-III human vaccine clinical trials and controlled human infection models. In the laboratory, the VTC interrogates human immunology to understand vaccine responsiveness, correlates of protection, and vaccine failure. Currently the VTC team's research focuses on flaviviruses, including Dengue and Zika, and enteric infections such as rotavirus, campylobacter, and polio, and most recently, SARS-CoV2.

Kirkpatrick is also the principal investigator of a National Institutes of Health-funded Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant--the Translational Global Infectious Diseases Research (TGIR) Center--which focuses on the development of the next generation of faculty investigators from both the biomedical and quantitative/modeling fields.

She received her M.D. from Albany Medical College and completed an internal medicine residency and chief residency at the University of Rochester and a fellowship in infectious diseases at Johns Hopkins University, during which she was trained in both basic and clinical/translational research. She received additional training in clinical tropical medicine in Lima, Peru. Kirkpatrick is currently a fellow of the American College of Physicians, The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, and the Infectious Diseases Society of America. 

The two other 2021-22 University Scholars are Donna Rizzo, Ph.D., professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Kimberly Vannest, Ph.D., professor and chair of education. Read more about the 2021-22 University Scholars. .