Viral Infections & Virology

Biography

Dr. Glorioso began his career as a professor in the Microbiology and Immunology and Laboratory Animal Medicine at the University of Michigan School of Medicine in 1976 and later in 1989, he moved to the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine as the W.S McEllroy Professor and Chair of the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics. He has established a 40-year history of research related to the basic biology and genetics of herpes simplex virus. His contributions to the field include defining antiviral immune responses to infection, the genetics of viral pathogenesis and latency, and mechanisms of viral infection. He has been a pioneer in the design and application of HSV gene vectors for the treatment of nervous system diseases such as peripheral neuropathies, chronic pain, and brain tumors. Dr. Glorioso’s most recent research has focused on (i) the design and application of HSV gene vectors for exploring the molecular events that occur in sensory afferents that are involved in the transition from acute to chronic pain, and he has been applied knowledge gained to the treatment of cancer-related pain in phase I clinical trials and (ii) the development of fully retargeted oncolytic HSV vectors for tumor-selective infection and microRNA controlled replication in human glioblastomas. This research has been applied to the treatment of syngeneic and xenograft models of human brain tumors. His research has launched two Biotech companies, Oncorus Inc. in Cambridge, MA and Coda Biotherapeutics Inc in San Francisco, CA. Oncorus utilizes oncolytic HSV vectors for the treatment of solid tumors by tumor lysis combined with immunomodulatory arming genes for induction of anti-tumor immunity. Coda Bio is a neuromodulation company that employs chemical genetics to silence painful conditions such as trigeminal and post-herpetic neuralgia and for treatment of neurogenic bladder, tremor and epilepsy.

Research Interest

HSV, viral infections