Richard T. Marconi, Ph.D.
Virginia Commonwealth University
Richard T. Marconi, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). He earned his Ph.D. at the University of Montana, where he studied the role of 23S rRNA in protein synthesis and antibiotic/ribosome interactions. He then conducted postdoctoral research at The Roche Institute for Molecular Biology, focused on bacterial metabolism. In 1990, he joined Rocky Mountain Laboratories as an Intramural Research Training Award (IRTA) fellow where he studied Lyme disease and tick-borne relapsing fever. In 1994, he joined the faculty at VCU.  
Marconi is recognized as a pivotal contributor to the development of chimeric epitope-based vaccines and diagnostic antigens. He is an inventor of the canine Lyme disease subunit vaccine Vanguard®crLyme. Marconi has received several awards throughout his career for his scientific achievements. In 2022, he was recognized for outstanding contributions to Virginia Biosciences. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and a senior member of the National Academy of Inventors. He has lectured worldwide, published over 140 research articles and is on the editorial board of several journals.
His lab is aggressively working on a novel chimeric epitope vaccine for human Lyme disease and vaccines and diagnostic assays for Ehrlichiosis, Anaplasmosis and Leptospirosis. The One Health concept is a driving force behind his research philosophy. In addition to translational research, the Marconi lab has been studying the role of cyclic nucleotides in bacterial pathogenesis and environmental adaptation.