Rafael E Hernandez, MD, PhD

Rafael E Hernandez, MD, PhD

Infectious Disease and Virology

On staff since July 2014

  • Biography

    Rafael E. Hernandez, MD, PhD, is a member of the Center for Global Infectious Disease Research (CGIDR) at Seattle Children's Research Institute and an acting instructor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Infectious Diseases, at the University of Washington. He also provides patient care as an attending physician in pediatric infectious diseases at Seattle Children's Hospital.

    He studied biology as an undergraduate at Dartmouth College and then completed a combined MD/PhD program at the University of Washington School of Medicine. He was a pediatrics resident and a fellow in pediatric infectious diseases at Seattle Childrens Hospital. He conducted his fellowship research with Dr. Lalita Ramakrishnan at the University of Washington before joining Seattle Children's Hospital as a principal investigator, focusing on mycobacterial pathogens.

    • Related Pages

    • Hernandez Lab

      Hernandez Lab

      In the Hernandez Lab, we use a combination of genetics, molecular biology, cell culture models and animal models to probe the interactions between mycobacterial pathogens and host immune cells.

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  • Awards and Honors

    Award Name Award Description Awarded By Award Date
    First place, student poster competition Northwest Regional Developmental Biology Meeting 2006
    Honorable mention student poster competition and student travel award Society for Developmental Biology 2004
    Washington Research Foundation and ARCS Foundation Fellowship 2003 - 2005
    Developmental Biology Training Grant, Competitive Placement 2002 - 2005

  • Publications

    Manuscripts in Refereed Journals

    • Adams KN, Verma AK, Gopalaswamy R, Adikesavalu H, Singhal DK, Tripathy S, Ranganathan UD, Sherman DR, Urdahl KB, Ramakrishnan L, Hernandez RE
      Diverse Clinical Isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis Develop Macrophage-Induced Rifampin Tolerance.
      30753612 The Journal of infectious diseases, 2019 Apr 19 : 219(10)1554-1558 PMCID:PMC6473171
    • Matty MA, Knudsen DR, Walton EM, Beerman RW, Cronan MR, Pyle CJ, Hernandez RE, Tobin DM
      Potentiation of P2RX7 as a host-directed strategy for control of mycobacterial infection.
      30693866 eLife, 2019 Jan 29 : 8 PMCID:PMC6351102
    • Hernandez RE, Galitan L, Cameron J, Goodwin N, Ramakrishnan L
      Delay of Initial Feeding of Zebrafish Larvae Until 8 Days Postfertilization Has No Impact on Survival or Growth Through the Juvenile Stage.
      30089231 Zebrafish, 2018 Oct. : 15(5)515-518 PMCID:PMC6198760
    • Roh-Johnson M, Shah AN, Stonick JA, Poudel KR, Kargl J, Yang GH, di Martino J, Hernandez RE, Gast CE, Zarour LR, Antoku S, Houghton AM, Bravo-Cordero JJ, Wong MH, Condeelis J, Moens CB
      Macrophage-Dependent Cytoplasmic Transfer during Melanoma Invasion In Vivo.
      29207258 Developmental cell, 2017 Dec 4 : 43(5)549-562.e6 PMCID:PMC5728704
    • Cambier CJ, Takaki KK, Larson RP, Hernandez RE, Tobin DM, Urdahl KB, Cosma CL, Ramakrishnan L
      Mycobacteria manipulate macrophage recruitment through coordinated use of membrane lipids.
      24336213 Nature, 2014 Jan. : 505(7482)218-22 PMCID:PMC3961847
    • Feng L, Hernandez RE, Waxman JS, Yelon D, Moens CB
      Dhrs3a regulates retinoic acid biosynthesis through a feedback inhibition mechanism.
      19874812 Developmental biology, 2010 Feb 1 : 338(1)1-14 PMCID:PMC2858591
    • Hernandez RE, Putzke AP, Myers JP, Margaretha L, Moens CB
      Cyp26 enzymes generate the retinoic acid response pattern necessary for hindbrain development.
      17164423 Development (Cambridge, England), 2007 Jan. : 134(1)177-87 PMCID:PMC1765950
    • Hernandez RE, Rikhof HA, Bachmann R, Moens CB
      vhnf1 integrates global RA patterning and local FGF signals to direct posterior hindbrain development in zebrafish.
      15342476 Development (Cambridge, England), 2004 Sept. : 131(18)4511-20
    • Waskiewicz AJ, Rikhof HA, Hernandez RE, Moens CB
      Zebrafish Meis functions to stabilize Pbx proteins and regulate hindbrain patterning
      11684652 Development, 2001 : 128(21)4139-4151
    • Ikegami M | Wada K | Emerson GA | Rebello CM | Hernandez RE | Jobe AH
      Effects of ventilation style on surfactant metabolism and treatment response in preterm lambs.
      American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine, 1998 Feb. : 157(2)638-44
    • Rebello CM | Ikegami M | Hernandez RE | Jobe AH
      Surfactant protein-B and lung function in surfactant-treated preterm lambs.
      Biology of the neonate, 1997 : 71(5)327-36

  • Presentations

    Presentation Title Event Location Date
    PCR to the Rescue, Clinical Cases from Seattle Childrens Hospital (Lecture) Northwest Branch Meeting American Society for Microbiology, 11/2015 Seattle, WA 2015
    Terror in the Community, Clinical Cases from Seattle Childrens Hospital (Lecture) Northwest Branch Meeting American Society for Microbiology, 10/2014 Seattle, WA 2014
    A zebrafish model for the role of IL-1 signaling in control of mycobacterial infections (poster) NIAID/IDSA Infectious Diseases Research Careers Meeting, 6/2013 Bethesda, MD 2013
    The role of IL1 signals and Myd88 in response to mycobacterial infections (platform) St Jude/PIDS Pediatric Infectious Diseases Research Conference, 2/2013 Memphis, TN 2013
    Case presentation: Wound botulism after a childhood scuffle (Lecture) Greater Seattle Microbiology Grand Rounds. Washington State Public Health Laboratory, 1/2012 2012
    Topics in Pediatric Tuberculosis House-staff noon teaching conference. Seattle Childrens Hospital 2012 - 2013
    Senior Resident Case Presentation: All I want is a sore throat, a case and review of invasive group A Streptococcal infections Seattle Children's Hospital 2011
    An expression based screen to identify targets of retinoic acid signaling during zebrafish embryogenesis Northwest Developmental Biology Conference Friday Harbor, WA 2006
    Retinoic acid establishes posterior hindbrain fates through activation and indirect repression of rhombomere-specific genes 4th European Zebrafish Genetics and Development Meeting Dresden, Germany 2005
    Retinoic acid establishes posterior hindbrain identities through a combination of activation and indirect repression of rhombomere specific genes Society for Developmental Biology Calgary, Canada 2004
    Macrophage induced tolerance to rifampin is common across diverse clinical isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (poster) Pac TB Symposium: West Coast Tuberculosis Meeting, 3/2018 Seattle, WA
    Exploring efflux pumps as new therapeutic targets in nontuberculous mycobacteria to inhibit intracellular growth and counteract drug tolerance (poster) North American Cystic Fibrosis Conference, 10/2016 Orlando, FL
    Targeting Efflux to counteract antibiotic tolerance in tuberculosis (Lecture) Seattle Children’s Research Institute CGIDR-CIIT Seminar Series, 5/2016 Seattle, WA
    Optimizing antibiotic treatment for mycobacterial infections (Lecture) Seattle Children’s Research Institute Inter-Center Discovery Lunch, 1/2018 Seattle, WA
    Strategies for improving antibiotic effectiveness against mycobacterial infections (Lecture) Seattle Children’s Research Institute CGIDR Seminar Series, 5/2019 Seattle, WA
    Wound botulism after a childhood scuffle (Lecture) Washington State Public Health Laboratory, 1/2012 Shoreline, WA
    Macrophage induced tolerance to rifampin is common across a range of clinical isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (poster) Gordon Conference: Tuberculosis Drug Discovery & Development, 6/2017 Barga, Italy
    Efflux pumps as new therapeutic targets for nontuberculosis mycobacteria. Keystone Symposium: Novel Therapeutic Approaches to Tuberculosis (poster) Keystone, 4/2014 Keystone, CO
    Efflux pumps as new therapeutic targets in nontuberculosis mycobacteria to counteract drug tolerance and inhibit intracellular growth (poster) Gordon Conference: Tuberculosis Drug Discovery & Development, 7/2015 Girona, Spain

  • Research Funding

    Grant Title Grantor Amount Award Date
    A pipeline for prioritizing and evaluating multidrug regimens for mycobacterium abscessus. R21 AI144536 NIH/NIAID $163,870 annual direct costs Mar 21, 2019 - Feb 28, 2021
    Translational research center to expedite novel therapies in cystic fibrosis: Microbiology core. P30 DK089507 NIH/NIDDKD Jul 1, 2015 - May 31, 2020
    The role of mycobacterial efflux pumps in virulence and antibiotic tolerance. K08 AI116908 NIH/NIAID $163,559 annual direct costs Mar 1, 2015 - Feb 29, 2020
    Efflux Pumps in Nontuberculosis Mycobacteria. Cystic Fibrosis Foundation/UW, CFF-RDP Pilot Project. Oct 1, 2014 - Sep 30, 2017
    The role of IL-1 and Inflammasome signaling in control of mycobacteria. NIH Diversity Supplement NIH/NIAID Aug 22, 2014 - Feb 28, 2015

Overview

Board Certification(s)

Pediatrics
Pediatric Infectious Diseases

Medical/Professional School

University of Washington, Seattle, WA

Residency

University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA

Fellowship

Seattle Children's Hospital, Seattle, WA

Research Description

The Hernandez Lab research focuses on understanding the pathogenesis of mycobacteria, including tuberculosis and related bacteria. In particular, he seeks to understand how mycobacteria interact with cells of the immune system to promote their own survival and how this interaction makes the bacteria more difficult to treat with antibiotics. Hernandez also heads the Cystic Fibrosis Isolate Core, which provides CF bacterial isolates to researchers at both academic/not-for-profit and commercial research institutions. The core collection contains thousands of isolates from CF patients. Core services to academic researchers are funded by the NIH as part of the Cystic Fibrosis Research and Translation Center at the University of Washington and Seattle Children's Research Institute.