Biography
Dr. Dormitzer leads Pfizer viral vaccines research and development programs that include a prefusion F-based RSV vaccine, a cytomegalovirus vaccine, and RNA-based COVID-19 and influenza vaccine collaborations with BioNTech. Before joining Pfizer, Dr. Dormitzer held positions at Novartis Vaccines that included Head of US Research. He was the founding member of the Novartis Viral Vaccine Research Center in Cambridge, MA. In 2009, his research team supported the development and licensure of three H1N1v influenza pandemic vaccines in the most rapid vaccine response in history. In 2013, his team responded to the H7N9 influenza outbreak by supplying the US pre-pandemic stockpile with a vaccine generated from a synthesized virus. Before joining the industry, Dr. Dormitzer was an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and led a structural virology laboratory, which, with collaborators, determined the structures of the rotavirus neutralization antigens. He graduated summa cum laude in Anthropology from Harvard College; conducted paleontological research in Pakistan and studied the Efe Pygmies in Zaire; obtained a Ph.D. in Cancer Biology and an MD at Stanford University; completed Internal Medicine training at Massachusetts General Hospital; and completed the Harvard Infectious Diseases Program, the clinical fellowship.