Dr. Leal has a broad background in microbiology, immunology, molecular biology and medicine with residency training in pathology and subspecialty fellowship training in medical microbiology.

He received his MD/PhD training in the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) at Case Western Reserve University, pathology residency training at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, and Microbiology fellowship training at the Cleveland Clinic.

He is certified by the American Board of Pathology in Clinical Pathology and Medical Microbiology and has a special clinical interest in medical mycology, parasitology, molecular diagnostics, infectious disease histopathology, and trainee education. He serves on the College of American Pathologists (CAP) Microbiology Resource Committee and Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) fungal diagnostics and antifungal subcommittee working groups.

His research interests include the development of novel molecular assays to more accurately diagnose infectious diseases and the utilization of model systems to identify key host and microbial mediators of fungal infection.

Today, his talk will span the spectrum from his team’s clinical response to the COVID pandemic in the State of AL and his research efforts to identify how viral respiratory infection renders an otherwise immunocompetent host susceptible to invasive mold infection.