Biography:

Ehud Lavi, M.D. is a Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, and Chief of the Neuropathology Service at Weill Cornell Medical College. He is providing service and consultations on all aspects of pathology of the brain, spinal cord, peripheral nerve and muscle.

Dr. Lavi has research interest in neurovirology and neuroimmunology. He has been investigating since 1982 coronavirus-induced demyelination,nbsp;an experimental model of multiple sclerosis in mice. The main focus of the investigation has been the interaction between viruses and the central nervous system (CNS), the role of astrocytes and microglia in cytokine signaling, and the role of viral glycoproteins in neurotropism.

Ehud Lavi, M.D. received his medical degree from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, and did a Neurology residency at Hadassah Hospital- The Hebrew University School of Medicine in Jerusalem, Israel. Following a research fellowship in Neurovirology at the University of Pennsylvania and the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia, he trained in Anatomic Pathology at Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia, followed by a Neuropathology fellowship at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1991 he joined the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania, where he served as Attending Neuropathologist until 2005 when he came to Cornell University.

Dr. Lavi published over 145 scientific publications, including research articles in the fields of neurovirology, neuroimmunology and neuropathology, reviews, editorials, and book chapters. Dr. Lavi published a book on Nidoviruses ( 2000) and a book on Experimental Models of Multiple Sclerosis (2005). Dr. Lavi served on study sections for the NIH, and the Department of Agriculture. He chaired the organizing committee of the 2000 International symposium on Nidoviruses. Dr. Lavi served on the editorial board of the Journal of Neuropathology and Experimental Neurology (1995-1998) and is on the Board of Directors of the International Society for Neurovirology and a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Neurovirology.

Publications:

• Gonzales DM, Fu L, Li Y, Das Sarma J, Lavi E. Coronavirus-induced demyelination occurs in the absence of CD28 co-stimulatory signals. J. Neuroimmunol. 146:140-143,2004.
  
• Fu L, Gonzales DM, Das Sarma J, Lavi E. A combination of mutations in the S1 part of the spike glycoprotein gene of coronavirus MHV-A59 abolishes demyelination. J. Neurovirol. 10:41-51, 2004
  
• Li Y, Fu L, Gonzales DM, Lavi E. Coronavirus neurovirulence correlates with the ability of the virus to induce pro-inflammatory cytokine signals by astrocytes and microglia. J. Virol. 78: 3398-3406, 2004.
  
• Coley SE, Lavi E, Sawicki SG, Fu L, Schelle B, Karl N, Siddell SG, Thiel V. Recombinant mouse hepatitis virus strain A59 from cloned, full-length cDNA replicates to high titers in vitro and is fully pathogenic in vivo. J. Virol. 79:3097-3106,2005.

Honors and Awards

• 1982 - Penn-Israel Wexler Fellowship Award.
  
• 1991 - NIH sponsored, Biomedical Research Support Grant (BRSG), University of Pennsylvania.
  
• 1991 - The Thomas B. McCabe and Jeannette E. Laws McCabe Award
  
• 1993 - University of Pennsylvania Research Foundation Award
  
• 1996 - The “Representative James Greenwood grant on “Molecular control of coronavirus induced demyelination”. The 1996 National Multiple Sclerosis Society Representative of the Year.
  
• 2001 - Member, The John Morgan Society, University of Pennsylvania.