Irving and Frances Silber Endowed Presidential Lectureship features Dr. Peter J. Hotez

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Please join the University of South Alabama for the Irving Silver and Frances Grodsky Silver Endowed Presidential Lectureship to feature distinguished pediatrician-scientist Dr. Peter J. Hotez. The free event is open to the public and will be held Feb. 10, 2026, at 4 p.m., at the MacQueen Alumni Center. Seating is limited, and online registration is required at SouthAlabama.edu/Lectureship. Hotez is professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, where he also serves as co-director of the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine. Additionally, he is a professor of biology at Baylor University and senior fellow in disease and poverty at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. Most recently, Hotez led the development of vaccines for parasitic infections — hookworm, schistosomiasis, Chagas disease — which are currently in clinical trials. In 2022, Hotez received a Nobel Peace Prize co-nomination recognizing the Texas Children’s Center for Vaccine Development and Baylor College of Medicine’s development of a low-cost, protein-based COVID-19 vaccine technology that has now been manufactured in India and Indonesia and administered to more than 100 million people. In addition to authoring more than 700 scientific papers, Hotez has written multiple books, including “Forgotten People Forgotten Diseases” (ASM-Wiley Press), “Preventing the Next Pandemic,” and “The Deadly Rise of Anti-science” (Johns Hopkins University Press). He frequently appears on national media to explain biomedicine and pandemics. Hotez is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has received numerous awards, including the Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Scientific Achievement Award from the American Medical Association, the David E Rogers Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges, and the Science and Society Award from Sigma Xi. He was named TIME Magazine Health100 in 2024. In 2015-16, Hotez served as the U.S. Science Envoy for vaccine diplomacy in the Middle East and North Africa for the State Department and White House, and he appears frequently on national media to explain biomedicine and pandemics. Hotez earned a bachelor’s degree from Yale University, medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College and Ph.D. from The Rockefeller University.