From left, National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities director John Ruffin; José Szapocznik, A.B. ’69, M.S. ’73, Ph.D. ’77; and Norma Kenyon, UM vice provost for innovation and Miller School of Medicine chief innovation officer, at the Miami CTSI’s inaugural research forum on obesity in February Photo by Jorge R. Perez

A $20 million National Institutes of Health grant has enabled the University of Miami to establish the Miami Clinical and Translational Science Institute in order to improve health outcomes in South Florida and beyond.

Allocated over five years, the prestigious Clinical and Translational Science Award places the University in an elite research consortium of 60 institutions charged with speeding the translation of biomedical discoveries into therapies, engaging communities in clinical research, and training new researchers to be better prepared to resolve complex health problems facing an increasingly diverse nation.

Led by José Szapocznik, A.B. ’69, M.S. ’73, Ph.D. ’77, chair of Epidemiology and Public Health at the Miller School of Medicine, the Miami CTSI spans all UM campuses. Its community advisory board is co-chaired by President Donna E. Shalala and Health Council of South Florida president and CEO Marisel Losa.

Ranked No. 38, the Miller School is Florida’s only Top 40 institution in the Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research’s national NIH funding rankings.

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Citizen ’Cane

Studying Creepy Crawlers to Save Lives

Insects will always be one spindly-legged step ahead of us, says Adriana Troyo Rodríguez, Ph.D. ’07, who’s been a fanatic follower of arthropods for as long as she can recall.

As a bug-obsessed child, she collected beetles, spiders, grasshoppers—whatever she could get her hands on in her native Costa Rica. “I even learned I had to give caterpillars the same plant they were feeding on when I collected them or they would not eat,” says Troyo Rodríguez, an associate professor of microbiology at the Universidad de Costa Rica in San Jose.

In 2010, at age 33, she was the first woman to be named Most Distinguished Scientist of the Year by Costa Rica’s Ministry of Science and Technology. The prize recognizes her achievements in researching Chagas disease, dengue fever, and other insect-borne tropical diseases.

After training with professors John C. Beier and Douglas O. Fuller in the College of Arts and Sciences’ interdisciplinary Ph.D. program, Troyo Rodríguez was involved in one of the world’s first efforts to study dengue epidemiology and Aedes aegypti ecology using high-resolution satellite imagery—a method that’s helping to predict outbreak times and locations.

“My latest scientific research is oriented toward understanding the epidemiology of rickettsial diseases such as typhus or spotted fevers, many of which are emerging tick-or flea-borne infections that can be fatal,” she says.

In addition to teaching, publishing research, and training health officials, Troyo Rodríguez’s days still revolve around collecting bugs. She travels door to door with her research team, taking blood, flea, and tick samples from dogs and other domestic pets. Her team also treks through forests to catch ectoparasites found on wild rodents and opossums.

“We begin the day with our rubber boots on at 7 a.m. and finish when the sun goes down, looking like we rolled in the mud with the animals—which we probably did,” she says.

The work is hard, sometimes dangerous, and ultimately lifesaving. “One of the most fulfilling aspects of my job,” says Troyo Rodríguez, “is knowing I can make a difference in my own country on topics where scientific research is very limited, but where we have much to give.”

—Robin Shear

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