Scientists in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Wadsworth Center have made several important discoveries towards the development of a Lyme disease vaccine. Lyme disease is a tick-borne infection that afflicts thousands of New Yorkers each year. The disease is caused by the bacterium, Borrelia burgdorferi, which proliferates in skin tissues at the site of a tick bite before spreading to other organs.

Supervisory and leadership level roles in the public health laboratory have seen a generational transition as more senior staff have retired in recent years. In response, Wadsworth Center: Community. Advancement. Recruitment. Engagement. (CARE) launched the first-ever Wadsworth Center’s “Leadership Academy”. The inaugural cohort of the Leadership Academy concluded their program recently, covering topics focused on managing people and communication strategies with practical assignments throughout the year. 

In a study to be published in the Tuberculosis journal, Drs. Keith Derbyshire and Todd Gray at the Wadsworth Center’s Division of Genetics identify targets for fighting infections by a dangerous and rising pathogen.

For the second year, the Wadsworth Center hosted a table at the Albany Tulip Festival. Despite the rainy weather, the table saw steady foot traffic, discussing the Center with approximately 65 individuals. Many people were surprised to hear that their Public Health Laboratory is located in the Capital Region, and that we are celebrating 125 years of working to keep them healthy and safe! Multiple people stopped just to say “thank you” for our efforts, and one individual that, even though there is a lot of complicated health news, we were one of their most trusted sources of information.

The Wadsworth Center has been educating undergraduate students for several decades through the Research Experience for Undergraduates Program. Over the last three years we have been building on that experience to launch and expand the summer Public Health Laboratory Academy – an applied research internship experience funded in partnership with the Association of Public Health Laboratories. This year, we have 16 synchronous-track students and three asynchronous-track interns across infectious disease, environmental health, and genetics.

University at Albany PhD student Ryan Gainor was recognized for his poster presentation at the University at Albany Showcase 2026. Ryan is a second-year doctoral student in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences within the Center for Integrated Health Sciences and conducts research in the Division of Environmental Health Sciences at the Wadsworth Center. 

Two New York birth hospitals have been selected to partner with the Wadsworth Center as recruitment sites for BEACONSNBS (Building Evidence and Collaboration for GenOmics in Nationwide Newborn Screening), a national research study evaluating the use of genome sequencing in newborn screening.

Dr. Denise Kay, Director of the Newborn Screening Program at the Wadsworth Center, attended a meeting of the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) Newborn Screening Molecular Subcommittee at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention in Atlanta. As Co-Chair of the subcommittee, Dr. Kay co-led the meeting.

Janice Pata, Director of the Division of Scientific Cores at the Wadsworth Center, advanced the longstanding educational partnership between the New York State Department of Health and the University at Albany during the 2025–2026 academic year by facilitating the nationally recognized Entering Mentoring program for the first time at the university.

Rapid advances in laboratory instrumentation, automation, and computational technologies have created unprecedented opportunities to strengthen the prevention, detection, and response to public health threats. The Wadsworth Center’s Community, Advancement, Recruitment, and Engagement (CARE) program has focused on promoting the adoption of automated workflows by ensuring that staff have access to high-quality training resources and in-house expertise.