Office:	Scaife Hall, Suite 813
	3550 Terrace Street
	Pittsburgh, PA 15261
Phone:	412-648-8152
Fax:	412-383-7982
E-mail:	ekh2@pitt.edu

Education
	BS, University of Pittsburgh, 1992
	PhD, West Virginia University, 2000

Training
	Postdoctoral, University of Pittsburgh, 2005

Dr. Halvas' researches the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1). Specifically, he focuses on the development, validation, and testing of new technologies to detect and quantify major- and low-frequency drug-resistant HIV-1 variants. He monitors HIV-1 drug-resistance and evolution by standard genotyping of patient samples, and he investigates the role of low-frequency HIV-1 drug-resistance variants on clinical outcomes. Dr. Halvas also dissects the mechanisms of HIV-1 pathogenesis, carcinogenesis, and persistence as related to HIV cure strategies. Early in his career, Dr. Halvas' research dissected the structural determinants important for reverse transcriptase fidelity as well as the development and validation of novel genotypic assays used on clinical samples from HIV-1 infected patients) enrolled in either the AIDS Clinical Trial Group (ACTG) or Microbicides Trials Network (MTN). This work was related to the detection/and quantification of major and minor drug-resistance variants employing standard genotyping, single genome sequencing (SGS), and allele-specific PCR in the context of ART efficacy and mother-to-child transmission. This research was instrumental in determining the predictive value that these major and minor HIV-1 drug-resistant variants have on clinical outcomes. Currently, Dr. Halvas' research involves investigating the role that clonal expansions of HIV-1 infected cells play in HIV-1 persistence and carcinogenesis. This research is being conducted through the application of SGS to detect cell­associated viral DNA and RNA, virus-associated RNA, and full length viral genomes, as well as the recovery of infectious virus, and the capture of integration sites in these HIV-1 infected cells.

Dr. Halvas works closely with the HIV Primary Care Center in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of Pittsburgh to determine why some HIV-1 infected patients have intermittently detectable viremia, which is likely related to clonal expansions of HIV-1 infected cells.

As a senior member of John Mellors' laboratory, Dr. Halvas’ educational interests are both instructional and supportive, which include training for medical doctors, fellows, graduate students, and technicians in relation to the numerous assays employed to detect and quantify HIV-1.

For my complete bibliography, Click Here.

Selected Publications: