Dr. James E. K. Hildreth

Dr. James E.K. Hildreth currently serves as Director of the Center for AIDS Health Disparities Research, a National Institutes of Health funded center at Meharry Medical College.  Dr. Hildreth’s wife of 26 years, Phyllis D. King is from Berkeley California and a graduate of Harvard University.  She is an attorney and served in the juvenile justice system of the state of Maryland for more than 20 years including Chief Counsel in the Public Defender’s office.  She was most recently Maryland’s Deputy Secretary for Juvenile Justice.  Dr. and Mrs. Hildreth have two children.  Sophia, 24, attended Duke University before joining the US Army.  She learned Chinese at the Defense Language Institute in Monterrey California and is currently an interrogator serving in Iraq.  James (Jay), 13, attends Ensworth School and is currently in the ninth grade.  He is involved in a number of sports, music, and other extracurricular activities.  The Hildreths are active members of Clark Memorial United Methodist Church in Nashville.

Dr. Hildreth was born and raised in Camden, Arkansas. He graduated valedictorian from Camden High School in 1975 and began studies at Harvard University that fall. He was selected as the first African American Rhodes Scholar from Arkansas in 1978 and graduated from Harvard magna cum laude in chemistry the following year. In the fall of 1979, Dr. Hildreth enrolled at Oxford University in England, graduating with a Ph.D. in Immunology in 1982. He returned to the United States to attend Johns Hopkins Medical School in Baltimore, taking a one-year leave of absence from medical school for a postdoctoral fellowship in pharmacology from 1983 to 1984. He obtained his M.D. from Johns Hopkins in 1987 and joined the Hopkins faculty as Assistant Professor. In 2002, Dr. Hildreth became the first African American in the 125-year history at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine to earn full Professorship with tenure in the basic sciences. Dr. Hildreth served Johns Hopkins for several years as the first Associate Dean for Graduate Studies. In July, 2005, Dr. Hildreth became Director of the National Institutes of Health Center for AIDS Health Disparities Research at Meharry Medical College.

            Dr. Hildreth began research on HIV and AIDS in 1986. His work focuses on blocking HIV infection by learning how HIV gets into cells. He has published more than 80 scientific articles and holds 7 patents based on his research.  One protein discovered by Dr. Hildreth while at Oxford is the basis for an FDA-approved drug, Raptiva, used to treat psoriasis. Dr. Hildreth is known internationally for his work on the role of lipids in HIV infection. He is currently developing a “chemical condom” to block HIV transmission in women.

Dr. Hildreth can be reached at jhildreth@mmc.edu