Janet K. Yamamoto is an American immunologist. Yanamoto is a professor of veterinary medicine at the
University of Florida
The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...
where she studies the spread of HIV/AIDS. In 1988, she co-developed a vaccine for the
feline version of HIV with
Niels C. Pederson and was subsequently elected to the
National Academy of Inventors
The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) is a US non-profit organization dedicated to encouraging inventors in academia, following the model of the National Academies of the United States. It was founded at the University of South Florida in 2010. ...
.
Early life and education
![Photograph of Albert Einstein with the Yamamoto Family in 1922](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Photograph_of_Albert_Einstein_with_the_Yamamoto_Family_in_1922.png)
Yamamoto is the granddaughter of
Sanehiko Yamamoto, who, while serving as the president of publishing house
Kaizosha, first translated
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
's work into Japanese. He subsequently befriended Einstein who, in return, helped her father become the first Japanese person to become an American citizen after
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
.
She earned her
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...
degree from the
University of California, Davis
The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a public land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The inst ...
and her PhD in microbiology from the
University of Texas Medical Branch
The University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) is a public academic health science center in Galveston, Texas. It is part of the University of Texas System. UTMB includes the oldest medical school in Texas, and has about 11,000 employees. In Febr ...
.
Career
UC Davis
Upon receiving her PhD, Yamamoto accepted a faculty position at the
UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine The University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine is the largest veterinary school in the United States. Established in 1948, the school is the primary health resource for California's various animal populations. In 2020, the schoo ...
where she began research with
Niels C. Pederson on the
feline version of HIV.
She had originally been recruited by the
UC Davis School of Medicine
The University of California Davis School of Medicine is the medical school of the University of California, Davis. Although the parent institution is near Davis, California, the medical school is in Sacramento, California.
History
Founded in 196 ...
after completing postdoctoral work on the Feline Leukemia Virus but remained with their veterinary school until 1993.
Yamamoto established the Laboratory of Comparative Immunology and Retrovirology in 1985, where they isolated the feline immunodeficiency virus for the first time in medical history in an effort to create a vaccine.
For a one-year term between 1988 and 1989, she also worked as a consultant in the Clinical Division of
Bio-Rad Laboratories.
University of Florida
In 1993, Yamamoto moved to the
University of Florida
The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...
where she re-established the Laboratory of Comparative Immunology and Retrovirology and continued researching the vaccine.
The immunization, created in 2002 and approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, was made from an inactivated form of the FIV virus itself. In recognition of her efforts, Yamamoto was named a Research Foundation Professor of Pathobiology at the University of Florida.
In 2005, Yamamoto conducted a research project in which cats were vaccinated with an experimental strain of the human AIDS virus. The conclusion of the project found that the felines vaccinated with the human strain were similarly protected as those vaccinated by feline strain. In the same year, she received the school's Pfizer Animal Health Award for Research Excellence. Yamamoto later collaborated with AIDS researcher
Jay A. Levy to help control the spread of HIV/AIDS in Caribbean and Latin American nations. In a further effort to combat the spread of HIV/AID, Yamamoto donated all of her patient income and parts of her salary to fund her research towards a cure for HIV.
Between 2010 and 2012, Yamamoto served as a consultant to the Idexx Laboratories at Westbrook and served as a member of the Clinical Immunology Society, the International AIDS Society, the American Association of Immunologists, Incorporated, the American Society for Microbiology, the New York Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and Phi Zeta Upsilon,
In recognition of her academic accomplishments, Yamamoto received a UF Research Foundation professorship at the University of Florida's College of Veterinary Medicine. The University of Florida Research Foundation (UFRF) Professorships are awarded for "a three-year term to tenured faculty campuswide for distinguished research and scholarship that is expected to lead to continuing distinction in their field."
On December 16, 2014, Yamamoto was named a fellow of the
National Academy of Inventors
The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) is a US non-profit organization dedicated to encouraging inventors in academia, following the model of the National Academies of the United States. It was founded at the University of South Florida in 2010. ...
for her discovery of the feline HIV vaccine. Yamamoto was named to the Florida Inventors Hall of Fame in 2015 for her discovery of the feline immunodeficiency virus. The following year, she was honored by the University of Florida as their "Inventor of the Year" for her achievements.
Selected publications
*''Pathogenesis of experimentally induced feline immunodeficiency virus infection in cats.'' (1988)
*''Feline T-lymphotropic lentivirus assay'' (1992)
*''Dual-subtype FIV vaccine (Fel-O-Vax® FIV) protection against a heterologous subtype B FIV isolate'' (2005)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yamamoto, Janet K.
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
Place of birth missing (living people)
HIV/AIDS researchers
American immunologists
American women academics
University of Texas Medical Branch alumni
University of Florida faculty
University of California, Davis alumni
University of California, Davis faculty
21st-century American women