Alan Watson PhD

Alan M. Watson, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh. His research investigates immune mechanisms involved in vaccine-induced long-term protection against viral infections. Specifically, he is working with a novel murine model for Yellow Fever Virus (YFV) vaccination and disease. For the first time, since the advent of the globally successful YFV live-attenuated vaccine, his work is taking advantage of the tools available in the murine system to determine immunological mechanisms of control and protection against wt-YFV infection. For 6 years before his current position, his work included ex vivo and in vitro characterization of CD8+ T cell responses directed toward determinants within SV40 TAg using both normal mice and models of SV40 TAg-induced tumors.

The bulk of his expertise involves multi-parameter flow cytometric analysis from ubiquitous and highly enriched rare populations of CD8+ T cells. Additionally, Alan has 10+ years of laboratory experience working in various fields including tumor immunology, molecular virology, parasitology, cell signaling, and cellular immunology. She has acquired skills in global information systems, molecular biology, multi-color confocal imaging, and the dissection of protein-protein interactions by immunoprecipitation and fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET).