NIAID’s Memoli Appointed NIH Acting Director

Dr. Matthew Memoli

Photo:  Chia-Chi Charlie Chang

Dr. Matthew J. Memoli was appointed as the acting NIH director, effective January 22. Memoli will serve in this role until a new NIH director is confirmed and on board at NIH.

In November, President-elect Donald Trump nominated Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor at Stanford, as the next NIH director. The nomination awaits confirmation by the U.S. Senate.

Memoli heads the clinical studies unit in the Laboratory of Infectious Diseases at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

He received his bachelor’s degree from the College of William and Mary and a master’s in microbiology from Thomas Jefferson University. He then received his medical degree from St. George’s University School of Medicine in the West Indies, Grenada. Memoli completed a residency in internal medicine at the Washington Hospital Center at Georgetown University. After completing an infectious disease fellowship in NIAID, he developed a clinical/translational research program to study influenza and other respiratory viruses.

“I know you have many questions about how the Presidential Executive Orders and Memoranda are affecting NIH broadly and your work specifically,” Memoli wrote to all NIH staff in a Jan. 31 email. “I assure you that we have an all-hands-on-deck effort to assess these directives and respond to them as efficiently as possible with the goal of ensuring that our vital work can continue. I am working closely with the new HHS leadership every day to determine the necessary actions and am transmitting that information to your Institute and Center leadership.”