Job E. Lopez

Job E. Lopez is an Associate Professor at Baylor College of Medicine in the Department of Pediatrics-Tropical Medicine, Houston, TX. His research focuses on tick-borne pathogens, particularly relapsing fever spirochetes such as Borrelia turicatae, and their interactions with vector ticks like Ornithodoros species. He holds a BA from La Sierra University (Riverside, CA), a PhD in Veterinary Microbiology and Pathology from Washington State University (2006), and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the NIH’s Rocky Mountain Laboratories (2011).

His work integrates molecular biology, epidemiology, and vector biology to study pathogen transmission dynamics. Key research areas include: 1) Understanding Borrelia spirochete adaptation to tick vectors, 2) Investigating tick-borne disease ecology in Latin America and the U.S., and 3) Developing diagnostic tools for relapsing fever. Recent studies highlight novel tick species discovery in Chile, genomic analysis of Borrelia strains, and molecular mechanisms of pathogen persistence in vectors.

Funded by NIAID/NIH grants, his projects explore molecular events in Borrelia life cycles, ecological studies in Panama, and vector colonization mechanisms. He is a member of the American Society for Microbiology, Entomological Society of America, and American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.