About

Professor and Department Chair, Pathology & Laboratory Medicine

Welcome to the website of the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Emory University School of Medicine. Pathology at Emory is a vibrant, multi-faceted department with nearly 100 faculty, more than 50 residents and clinical fellows, scores of postdocs and graduate students, and over 100 staff, all dedicated to our three core missions of patient care, teaching, and research on human disease. This website provides an overview of the Department, with links to information about specific faculty and programs, as well as details on how to apply to our outstanding residency program or clinical fellowships.

Physicians who wish to submit specimens for diagnostic evaluation or slides for expert consultation will find the necessary forms and information and are also encouraged to contact us through the telephone number listed in the footer of this page.

The word "pathology" means "the study of disease," and describes a specialty in clinical medicine and a field of biomedical research. In the clinical realm, pathology is the subspecialty devoted to diagnosis, either through microscopic examination of cells and tissues (called anatomic pathology) or by laboratory methods such as chemical analyses, microbiology, blood banking, tissue typing, etc (called clinical pathology). The investigative branch of pathology, called experimental pathology, covers the spectrum from laboratory research on basic cellular and molecular biology, through physiology and disease models, to drug discovery and translational research -- all with the aim of achieving better understanding of, and better treatments for human disease. Our Department strives continually to advance pathology research and clinical practice, developing new insights, methods, and technologies through the world-class expertise of our faculty.

This traditionally strong Department is recognized as one of the premier pathology programs in the United States. Our Anatomic Pathology division is renowned in soft tissue, gastrointestinal, and neuropathology and has exceptional strength in a host of other areas, including genitourinary, head & neck, renal, pediatric, and cytologic pathology. Our Clinical Pathology division offers outstanding expertise in subspecialties that include transfusion medicine, hematopathology, coagulation, HLA/tissue typing, clinical chemistry, microbiology, cytogenetics, and molecular diagnostics. With 30 funded faculty investigators and more than $45 million of research grant support annually, we have ranked among the top 6 NIH-funded Pathology departments in each of the past eight years, and among the top 10 in the world for high-impact publications in Pathology over the past decade. Our Experimental Pathology division is noted for its strengths in immunology, HIV/AIDS, molecular oncology, neuroscience, and microbial pathogenesis, as well as for fundamental cell and molecular biology. We are integral members and collaborators of Emory Vaccine Center, the Winship Cancer Institute, and the Emory National Primate Research Center.

Our residency program is one of the largest in the country. Residents benefit from our balanced strength in all three divisions; from faculty who are expert, accessible, and dedicated to teaching; from working closely with clinical fellows in a dozen subspecialties of pathology; and from the opportunity to train in five major teaching hospitals within one of America's largest, most diverse, and most livable metropolitan areas.

In addition to serving at Emory University Hospital, our residents gain broad experience at the community-based Grady Memorial and EUH-Midtown Hospitals, at our busy Veterans Hospital, and at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta (one of the largest pediatric health centers in the U.S.), and by studying challenging cases sent to us from around the world for expert consultation. Additionally, all of our residents receive superb training in forensic pathology at the Fulton County Medical Examiner's office, while our affiliated faculty at the adjacent U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) offer an unparalleled resource in infectious disease pathology and emerging pathogens.

Yet despite its size, its diverse missions, and its rapid pace of growth, Pathology at Emory remains a closely knit and interactive community, united by our pride in the physicians and scientists we train and by our shared commitment to excellence in research and patient care. It's a pleasure to welcome you to our Department.

About the Chair

Dr. Guido Silvestri is currently a Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in Comparative Pathology, as well as Professor and Chair in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Emory University School of Medicine, in which he also serves as Director of the Division of Experimental Pathology (EP). In addition, Dr. Silvestri is Chief of the Division of Microbiology & Immunology at the Emory National Primate Research Center.

Since 1993, Dr. Silvestri has been involved in studies of AIDS pathogenesis, prevention, and therapy, mostly using non-human primate models of SIV and SHIV infection, with particular focus on comparative studies of pathogenic and non-pathogenic primate lentiviral infections. Dr. Silvestri is currently the principal investigator or a co-investigator of numerous NIH grants, including a prestigious R37 MERIT award, and he is involved in both the Consortium for Innovative AIDS Research (CIAR) in non-human primates, the Center for HIV/AIDS Vaccine Immunology (CHAVI), and the Collaboratory of AIDS Researchers for Eradication (CARE).

Dr. Silvestri has authored or co-authored 242 peer-reviewed publications in this field, including some in the highest-impact journals (Cell, Science, Nature, Nature Medicine, Immunity, etc), as well as two books. He has given invited lectures at >100 different institutions and seminar series in 25 different countries. His work has been quoted >20,000 times, and has been presented in plenary sessions at all the major virology and immunology conferences worldwide. Dr. Silvestri is an Editor of the Journal of Virology, an Associate Editor of PLoS Pathogens, and a past Editor of the Journal of Immunology.

He served as Chairman or Standing Member in >50 study sections and advisory committees at the National Institutes of Health, the Canadian Institute for Health Research, the American Foundation for AIDS Research, the Australian Medical Research Council, the European Commission, and various others. Since 2018 Dr. Silvestri is President of the Scientific Council of the Agence Nationale pour la Recherche sur le SIDA, He is a member of the Scientific Committee of the Conference on Retrovirus and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), of the International AIDS Society Scientific Working Group on HIV Cure, and Co-Chaired the 9th International AIDS Conference in Paris, July 2017.