Stephen J. Thomas, MD, is a Professor of Medicine, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, Director of the Institute for Global Health and Translational Science, and Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY. Dr. Thomas is also the founder and CEO of Cormac Life Sciences, LLC, a Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business.

Dr. Thomas is a physician-scientist with over 20 years of active duty service in the U.S. Army caring for patients at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and conducting biomedical research and development (R&D) at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR). At the WRAIR, Dr. Thomas focused on developing medical countermeasures against viral diseases threatening U.S. Service Members to include dengue, Japanese encephalitis, Zika, Ebola, MERS-CoV, and influenza. He spent more than five years living and working in Thailand and Southeast Asia. Dr. Thomas’s last position in the Army was as the Deputy Commander for Operations at the WRAIR and the Infectious Diseases Consultant to the U.S. Army Surgeon General.

Following his military service, Dr. Thomas joined the College of Medicine at SUNY Upstate. During his time at Upstate he has continued his work on dengue with a focus on developing experimental human infection models to support vaccine and drug development. He leads a clinical Division in providing Infectious Disease consultation to four regional hospitals and 10% of NY state’s population. Dr. Thomas also directs a global health and translational sciences institute focused on identifying important health problems, conceptualizing or identifying potential solutions, and then guiding these potential solutions through the R&D process.