Nicholas Komar, ScD
Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention
Arbovirus Diseases Branch
Fort Collins, Colorado

Dr. Tracey McNamara, DVM
College of Veterinary Medicine
Western University of Health Sciences, Pomona, California

"Decade of Death: West Nile virus in the New World"
Dr. Komar has been the vertebrate ecologist for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Arbovirus Diseases Branch in Fort Collins since 1997. In 1999 he participated in the field investigation of the historic West Nile virus outbreak in New York City, and has been immersed in West Nile virus research, surveillance and guidance ever since. Nick has authored and co-authored more than 80 scientific publications, most of them treating the ecology of West Nile virus, its spread throughout the Americas and ecological surveillance techniques for monitoring this virus. Nick was instrumental in the establishment of nationwide capacity for early detection of WNV in new locations using avian mortality surveillance. Nick came to CDC with a science doctorate in infectious disease epidemiology earned at Harvard School of Public Health's Department of Tropical Public Health, where he was mentored by the late Professor Andrew Spielman. Nick also earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular Biology from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, studied Chemistry and International Development during his junior year at the University of East Anglia (Norwich UK), and served one year as Visiting Professor in the Department of Biochemistry of the Medical School at the National University of El Salvador. Outside his capacity of research scientist with CDC, Nick is an avid birder and wildlife photographer (his best work can be viewed at www.pbase.com/quetzal), and stays physically active playing baseball and softball. He is also a volunteer youth baseball coach and field trip leader for Fort Collins Audubon Society.

"West Nile virus: One world-One health before it was fashionable"
A veterinary pathologist, Dr. McNamara specializes in the recognition and understanding of the diseases of captive and free-ranging wildlife and is best known for her work on West Nile virus in birds. She has been profiled in numerous publications including New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, Nature, Smithsonian Magazine and many others. Her training as a comparative zoo and wildlife pathologist is cited as having "led her to pursue a link between viral encephalitis in birds and humans during the summer of 1999. Her research ultimately led to a diagnosis of West Nile virus, a virus never before found in the Western Hemisphere." In The Scientist (March 4, 2002), she is credited as having "served a central role as a unifying force, molding and sometimes forcing interrelationships between local and federal government agencies and private enterprises, enabling progress toward the common goal of monitoring a newly emerging disease in the United States." She also received the AAZV Presidential Service Award in recognition of her creation and coordination of the surveillance for West Nile Virus in Zoological Institutions" project.