Dr. James received her Ph.D. in Microbiology from Vanderbilt University, conducted post-doctoral studies in the Department of Medicine at Harvard University and the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, NIAID, NIH, and subsequently established a research laboratory at the George Washington University Medical Center, where her work focused on the immunology of parasitic infections and macrophage biology.  In 1987, Dr. James returned to NIAID to serve as the Parasitology Program Officer within its extramural component.  From 1991 to 2001, she was Chief of the Parasitology and International Programs Branch in the Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, NIAID.  There she was responsible for programmatic development of the Tropical Medicine Research Centers and the International Centers for Excellence in Research, co-authored the institute’s Research Plan for Malaria Vaccine Development and Research Agenda for Emerging Infectious Diseases, and was involved in the formation of the International Centers for Tropical Disease Research and the Multilateral Initiative on Malaria (for which she received the NIH Director’s Award in 1993 and 1999, respectively). 

Dr. James joined The Ellison Medical Foundation in 2001, where she served for three years as Deputy Director, and director of the Global Infectious Disease program.  She moved to the FNIH in 2004, to become the Associate Director for Science and Deputy Director of the Grand Challenges in Global Health (GCGH) initiative.  In 2008, she became Director of Science and Director of the GCGH initiative at FNIH.  She currently is principal investigator of the GCGH and Vector-based Control of Transmission Discovery Research programs at FNIH, and manages administrative components of the Comprehensive T Cell-Vaccine Immune Monitoring Consortium, Centralized Envelope Comparative Immunogenicity, and Identification of High-quality HITs for Tuberculosis projects.

Dr. James has served on advisory committees to the World Health Organization, the US Agency for International Development, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, and the Merck Foundation.  She is a member of the U.S. Delegation of the U.S.-Japan Cooperative Medical Sciences Program.  In 1998, she served as the elected President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

Contact information: sjames [at] fnih [dot] org, (301) 443-1598