Opendra "Bill" Narayan (November 28, 1936 – December 24, 2007) was an

HIV/AIDS research HIV/AIDS research includes all medical research that attempts to prevent, treat, or cure HIV/AIDS, as well as fundamental research about the nature of HIV as an infectious agent and AIDS as the disease caused by HIV. Transmission A body of sc ...

er at the

Johns Hopkins School of Medicine The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHUSOM) is the medical school of Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Established in 1893 following the construction of the Johns Hopkins Hospital, th ...

and the

University of Kansas Medical Center The University of Kansas Medical Center, commonly referred to as KU Med or KUMC, is a medical campus for the University of Kansas. KU Med houses the university's schools of medicine, nursing, and health professions, with the primary health scienc ...

. A veterinarian, Narayan researched animal models of

HIV The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of '' Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the im ...

. His focus on finding a vaccine for

retroviral A retrovirus is a type of virus that inserts a DNA copy of its RNA genome into the DNA of a host cell that it invades, thus changing the genome of that cell. After invading a host cell's cytoplasm, the virus uses its own reverse transcriptase e ...

infection had some success against a monkey retrovirus, SIV,"Renowned Kansas University AIDS Researcher Bill Narayan, 71, Dies of Heart Attack."
Dharmendra Ashwal, All Headline News, December 27, 2007, and he is best known for engineering a type of HIV that could cause AIDS-like disease in monkeys.

Research

Education and training

Born in

Guyana Guyana, officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern coast of South America, part of the historic British West Indies. entry "Guyana" Georgetown, Guyana, Georgetown is the capital of Guyana and is also the co ...

, Narayan earned his doctorate in veterinary medicine (DVM) from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...

in 1963. In 1970, he received a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

virology Virology is the Scientific method, scientific study of biological viruses. It is a subfield of microbiology that focuses on their detection, structure, classification and evolution, their methods of infection and exploitation of host (biology), ...

from the

University of Guelph The University of Guelph (abbreviated U of G) is a comprehensive Public university, public research university in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. It was established in 1964 after the amalgamation of Ontario Agricultural College (1874), the MacDonald I ...

. Narayan trained as a

postdoctoral researcher A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary acade ...

with renowned neurovirologist Richard T. Johnson at the

beginning in 1972.

Career

Narayan remained at Johns Hopkins as a faculty member and became director of the Retrovirus Biology Laboratory. Narayan left Johns Hopkins in 1992. He moved to the University of Kansas, where he was named Distinguished Professor and director of the Marion Merrell Dow Laboratory of Viral Pathogenesis. Narayan remained at Kansas until his death in 2007. While at the University of Kansas, Narayan received nearly $50 million in grants, including almost $20 million from the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...

Honors

Narayan was presented with the Pioneer in NeuroVirology Award by the International Society for NeuroVirology (ISNV) at the 7th International Symposium on NeuroVirology held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 2006.

Controversy

Simon Watney Simon Watney is a British writer, art historian, and AIDS activist. His 1987 article, "The Spectacle of AIDS", was included in ''The Gay and Lesbian Studies Reader''. He also published ''Policing Desire: Pornography, AIDS and the Media'' in 1986. ...

has described Narayan's explanation of the spread of HIV/AIDS among gay males as 'uniquely disgusting'

Policing Desire: Pornography, Aids, and the Media, (1997) Page 111
/ref> when he quotes Narayan's statement that:

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Narayan, Opendra 1936 births 2007 deaths HIV/AIDS researchers American veterinarians Virologists University of Toronto alumni University of Guelph alumni