Nanoparticles for Rational Vaccine Design / Current Topics in Microbiology and Immunology Bd.433 (PDF)

Endowed Chair in Science and Engineering at Texas Tech.

Dr. Richard W. Compans is a professor in, and former chair of, the Department of Microbiology and Immunology in the Emory University School of Medicine. Over the four decades of his career, he has made broad and impactful contributions to our understanding of the structure and assembly of influenza and other viruses, and to developing and improving vaccines.


Dr. Compans received his PhD from the Rockefeller University in 1968, where he was a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow studying with Dr. Purnell W. Choppin, one of the virology giants of the era, who is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and went on to serve as President of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. For his PhD, Dick studied the structural organization and assembly of parainfluenza viruses. He carried out postdoctoral studies at the Australian National University with Dr. Frank Fenner, an eminent virologist, where he began research on influenza viruses.

After returning to the Rockefeller as a faculty member from 1969 to 1975, Dr. Compans was recruited to UAB, where he served as Professor of Microbiology from 1975 to 1992.

In 1992, Dr. Compans was recruited to Emory as Professor and Chair of Microbiology and Immunology. During 15 years as chair, he recruited 15 new faculty and obtained the initial support from the Georgia Research Alliance to establish the Emory Vaccine Center. In 2007 he became Director of the newly funded Influenza Center. Dr. Compans has continued his work on influenza virus and is exploring the use of virus-like particle-based vaccine antigens to elicit protective immune responses against viral infection. His interests have expanded to include emerging viruses such as Ebola, Lassa, and Marburg viruses, and collaborative projects with Georgia Tech investigating new delivery methods such as vaccine coated microneedle patches.

Dr. Compans has authored more than 500 manuscripts and ten books. His work has been cited over 35,000 times. He was the editor of the Virus Research from 1983-2003 and has served and continues to serve on several editorial boards and review committees.