James W. Bremer, PhD

James W. Bremer, PhD is a professor in the Department of Immunity & Emerging Pathogens at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, IL. In addition, he holds the positions of director of the Clinical Retrovirology Research Laboratory, principal investigator and director of the NIAID Virology Quality Assurance Program, and director of the Rush BSL-3 Laboratory Core.

Bremer’s research background includes more than 42 years of both basic and translational science endeavors. He has worked in the HIV-1 field for more than 30 years and has worked extensively on early infant diagnosis and on women’s studies. He helped develop the Virology Quality Assurance Program for NIH/NIAID as project coordinator in Houston and then competed and brought the VQA to Chicago 23 years ago as the principal investigator. The current contract will run through 2019.

During his tenure as director of the VQA, he has been instrumental in standardizing HIV-1 cocultures, HIV-1 p24 antigen quantitation and HIV-1 RNA assays by providing a common reference HIV-1 RNA to which most commercial assays are validated. In addition, the VQA has developed proficiency programs for quantitative HIV-1 RNA, qualitative HIV-1 DNA, and HIV-1 genetic drug resistance testing.  

Besides HIV-1, Bremer also has a strong interest and active assay development for other viral opportunistic infections, such as HBV, HCV, HCMV, and HPN. Investigations cover virus quantitation as well as their genotype and drug resistance in HIV-1 co-infected patients with an emphasis on standardizing existing assays and developing new assays where none presently exist.