Team Members
David Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, MSc, FCPP
Founding Director of the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment & Laboratory
David Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, MSc, is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the youngest faculty members to receive tenure in the history of Penn Medicine. He is also the Founding Director of the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment & Laboratory, co-Founder & President of the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network, co-Founder & President of Every Cure, and the national bestselling author of ‘Chasing My Cure: A Doctor’s Race to Turn Hope Into Action.’
He is also a patient battling idiopathic multicentric Castleman disease (iMCD), which he discovered a repurposed treatment for that is saving his life and others. He has also advanced 13 other repurposed treatments for diseases they weren’t initially intended for. One of the youngest ever awardees of multiple top NIH and FDA grants, Dr. Fajgenbaum has published nearly 100 scientific papers in high-impact journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet, and the Journal of Clinical Investigation, including a paper selected as one of the top innovations in science and medicine of 2020.
Joshua Brandstadter, MD, PhD, MSc
Director of Clinical Research
Dr. Joshua Brandstadter is a physician-scientist and Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology/Oncology at the University of Pennsylvania. As Director of Clinical Research for the CSTL, Dr. Brandstadter oversees the ACCERLERATE Natural History Registry to better understand patient experiences and the comparative effectiveness of different treatments. He cares for patients with Castleman Disease in clinic and pursues laboratory research to better understand the causes of the disease. Dr. Brandstadter holds an MSc in Integrated Immunology from the University of Oxford and a combined MD/PhD from Duke University. He completed his internal medicine and hematology/oncology training at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.
Katherine S. Forsyth, PhD
Senior Research Investigator 
Katherine S. Forsyth, PhD is a Senior Research Investigator at the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment and Laboratory (CSTL) at the University of Pennsylvania. She obtained her PhD in Immunology from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine and was a Postdoctoral Fellow in Montserrat C. Anguera’s lab at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. Currently she works in the translational laboratory to understand the mechanisms that drive cytokine storms and identify new treatments for Castleman disease. Outside of the lab Katherine enjoys tending her community garden plot and catering to the whims of her cat Theo.
Michael Gonzalez, PhD
Associate Director of Basic and Translational Research
Michael V. Gonzalez, PhD, is the Associate Director of Basic and Translational Research at the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment and Laboratory (CSTL) within the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He obtained his PhD in Immunology and Infectious Diseases from Washington State University and was a postdoctoral fellow and bioinformatics scientist at the Center for Applied Genomics at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia before coming to the CSTL. His research focuses on utilizing novel ’omics technologies to gain insights into the genetic and cellular architectures of Castleman Disease and other disorders involving autoimmunity.
Melanie Mumau, PhD
Associate Director of Immunology
Melanie Mumau, PhD, is the Associate Director of Immunology at the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment & Laboratory (CSTL) at the University of Pennsylvania. Melanie is an experimental immunologist by training and oversees all research related to the translational laboratory. She is currently working on understanding the mechanisms that drive cytokine storms and developing new treatments for patients. Melanie earned her PhD in Microbiology & Immunology from Columbia University and prior to joining the CSTL, her research focused on how the immune system regulates the development of blood cells. Melanie enjoys playing soccer, skiing, and making pizza.
Joseph Zinski, PhD
Senior Research Investigator
Joseph Zinski, PhD is a Senior Research Investigator at the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment and Laboratory (CSTL) within the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He received his BS from UConn in Chemical Engineer and his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in developmental biology. He is using bioinformatic, machine learning, and deep learning to develop better diagnostic tools and treatments for Castleman disease.