About
John A. Belperio, MD is the Interim Chief and Professor of Medicine in the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, Sleep Medicine, Clinical Immunology and Allergy at The David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Dr. Belperio completed undergraduate at Drexel University in Philadelphia with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering, Medical School at the Temple University and Residency training at The University of Maryland. He then completed fellowship training in Pulmonary and Critical Care at The University of Michigan. After fellowship he was recruited to the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at The David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and has served on faculty ever since. His research program has focused on the role of chemokines and cytokine during the pathogenesis of lung allograft dysfunction, interstitial lung diseases (i.e. Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis and Sarcoidosis) and Obstructive lung disease (COPD/emphysema and bronchiectasis). His work in the area of CC chemokines has demonstrated that these proteins are key in recruiting specific populations of pro-fibrotic mononuclear cells to the lung allograft during allograft dysfunction and interstitial lung disease. His work on ELR- CXC chemokines has demonstrated their role in neutrophil recruitment and angiogenesis during chronic lung allograft rejection (CLAD) and Sarcoidosis. He also found that interferon inducible ELR- CXC chemokines were important in recruiting memory T cell to the lung allograft that eventually leads to CLAD. His work involves human samples in combination with molecular and cellular biology techniques, which are then brought to murine model systems to prove proof of concept that these proteins are actively involved in the above disease.