Assoc Prof Igor Almeida

Dr. Almeida obtained a Pharmacy degree at Universidade Regional do Nordeste (URNe, currently Universidade Estadual da Paraíba-UEPb), Campina Grande, PB, Brazil, in 1981. After a two-year training in Medical Technology at Georgia State University, Atlanta, in 1985 he entered the Master program in Molecular Biology at the Escola Paulista de Medicina (currently Universidade Federal de Sao Paulo-UNIFESP), Sao Paulo, Brazil, under the supervision of Prof. Carl Peter von Dietrich. During that time he became interested in Glycobiology, and his dissertation was on the structural analysis and biosynthesis of sulfated glycosaminoglycans.

After receiving his MSc degree in 1989, he started his PhD training in Microbiology and Immunology at UNIFESP, under the supervision of Prof. Luiz R. Travassos. The focus of his thesis was the characterization of lytic anti-a-Gal antibodies isolated from patients with Chagas’ disease, and the identification of molecular targets for these antibodies in infective forms of Trypanosoma cruzi. At his final PhD year, he spent about six months at the laboratory of Prof. Michael A.J. Ferguson, Dundee, Scotland, UK, where he could finally identify the targets for the anti-a-Gal Abs, which turned out to be abundant glycosylphosphatidylinositol (GPI)-anchored glycoproteins that resembled the mammalian mucins. In 1996, after a two-year period as visiting/substitute assistant-professor at the Dept. of Microbiology, Immunology and Parasitology, UNIFESP, he earned a fellowship from FAPESP-Brazil to carry out his post-doctoral training at the laboratory of Prof. Ferguson, in Dundee, where he continued his studies on the structure and immunological functions of GPI-anchors of T. cruzi.

At the end of 1998 he returned to Brazil, where he was offered a position as assistant professor at the Parasitology Department, University of Sao Paulo (USP), Sao Paulo, Brazil. At USP, Dr Almeida created a new research group focused in the structure and function of GPIs and lipids from T. cruzi. Also, he was involved in several collaborative studies with research groups from Brazil and abroad, aiming at the structural and functional characterization of glycoconjugates and lipids from various pathogens and disease vectors.

In November 2004 he joined UTEP as an Associate Professor at the Department of Biological Sciences. Here, Dr Almeida continues his studies on structure and immunological roles of GPI-anchored glycoconjugates and lipids of T. cruzi, trying to understand how the parasite modulates and evades the host immune response. His ultimate goal is the development of new therapeutic approaches for Chagas’ disease.