David A. Fidock

David A. Fidock (born 8 December 1965), is the CS Hamish Young Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and Professor of Medical Sciences at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in Manhattan.

Education
Fidock attended the University of Adelaide and earned a bachelor of mathematical sciences and an honors degree in genetics in 1985. He earned a PhD in microbiology from the Institut Pasteur in Paris in 1994. His dissertation advisor was Pierre Druilhe, and his thesis was titled "Molecular and Immuno-Epidemiological Studies of the Plasmodium falciparum STARP and LSA-1 Antigens Expressed During the Pre-Erythrocytic Stages in Humans". He underwent postdoctoral training with Anthony James at University of California, Irvine, and with Thomas Wellems at the National Institutes of Health.

Career
After his post-doctoral training, Fidock joined the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. In 2007, Fidock became an Associate Professor at Columbia University in the Departments of Microbiology and Immunology and of Medicine (Division of Infectious Diseases). Since 2008, Fidock has been a tenured Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and of Medical Sciences at Columbia. In 2017 he received the C.S. Hamish Young endowed Professorship. From 2008-2023 he served as the Program Director of the NIH T32-funded Graduate Program in Microbiology, Immunology, and Infection. In 2023, he was elected as the incoming President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

Research
Fidock's research focuses on the genetic and molecular mechanisms behind antimalarial drug resistance in the human parasite Plasmodium falciparum, as well as target-based drug discovery and development, and parasite metabolism and biology. He led the development of methods for genetically modifying malaria parasites and for elucidating the genetic basis of P. falciparum resistance to various first-line medicines (including artemisinin, chloroquine and piperaquine).

He has published more than 280 papers on malaria, with a current h-index of 97. His work has been cited over 34,000 times. His work has been funded by the NIH, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Department of Defense, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund and the Medicines for Malaria Venture.

Honors

 * 1992 "Bourse Roux" Scholarship, Pasteur Institute, Paris
 * 1994 Ph.D. Graduate, Summa cum Laude, University Paris VII/Pasteur Institute, Paris
 * 2001 New Initiatives in Malaria Research, Burroughs Wellcome Fund
 * 2001 Speaker's Fund in Biomedical Research, New York Academy of Medicine
 * 2001 New Scholar in Global Infectious Disease, Ellison Medical Foundation
 * 2004 Investigator in Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease, Burroughs Wellcome Fund
 * 2014 Recipient of the Bailey K. Ashford Medal for Distinguished Research in Tropical Medicine from the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
 * 2015 Elected to the Council of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
 * 2016 Elected as a Fellow of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
 * 2016 Advance Global Australian of the Year in Life Sciences, given by the Australian Prime Minister
 * 2020 Recipient, William Trager Medal for transformative research in molecular parasitology, American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
 * 2020 Winner of the 2020 Project of the Year from the Medicines for Malaria Venture for critical contribution to malaria drug resistance profiling
 * 2023 Elected Member, American Academy of Microbiology
 * 2023 Elected as President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene

Publications

 * Determinants of piperaquine-resistant malaria in South America. Lancet Infect Dis. (Epub ahead of print.)
 * The Plasmodium falciparum ABC transporter ABCI3 confers parasite strain-dependent pleiotropic antimalarial drug resistance. Cell Chem Biol (in press).
 * Plasmodium falciparum K13 mutations in Africa and Asia impact artemisinin resistance and parasite fitness. Elife 10: e66277.
 * Inhibition of resistance-refractory P. falciparum kinase PKG delivers prophylactic, blood stage, and transmission-blocking antiplasmodial activity. Cell Chem Biol 27: 806-16.
 * Insights into the intracellular localization, protein associations and artemisinin resistance properties of Plasmodium falciparum K13. PLoS Pathog 16: e1008482.
 * Covalent Plasmodium falciparum-selective proteasome inhibitors exhibit a low propensity for generating resistance in vitro and synergize with multiple antimalarial agents. PLoS Pathog 15: e1007722.
 * Plasmodium falciparum resistance to piperaquine driven by PfCRT. Lancet Infect Dis 19: 1168-9.
 * Structure and drug resistance of the Plasmodium falciparum transporter PfCRT. Nature 576: 315-20.