Next Generation Finalist - Tessa Cannon

Tessa Cannon is a graduate student and Presidential Fellow in the Department of Anthropology. A species of West African monkey, the sooty mangabey, is the natural reservoir of SIV that became HIV-2 when it crossed the species gap to humans. Sooty mangabeys carry the virus but do not develop AIDS despite bearing very high viral loads. Cannon’s work focuses on understanding relationship between the natural feeding ecology, gut microbiome and ability of sooty mangabeys to resist AIDS, we are better able to understand the pathogenesis of SIV, HIV and, ultimately, AIDS in humans. Her work is first to integrate eco-behavioral information (including data on viral load) on sooty mangabeys in their natural habitat with similar data on these monkeys under laboratory conditions. It has relevance in the domains of public health, primate behavioral ecology and conservation. In support of her PhD project, Cannon received funding form the President’s Research Excellence program and several awards from the Infectious Diseases Institute. In 2022, she was awarded a Presidential Fellowship, the most prestigious award given by the graduate school. She founded For the Love of Primates, a non-profit sanctuary for retired research primates, which earned her a President’s Buckeye Accelerator award in 2022. Cannon serves as Chair of the Graduate Student in Anthropology Committee, works as a vet tech for the Central Ohio Programs for Animal Welfare and the Humane Society, works as an undergraduate mentor in the Hale Lab, and is an adjunct professor at Columbus State Community College. Cannon earned her bachelor’s degree in zoology from Ohio Wesleyan University, her master’s degree in primate conservation from Oxford Brookes University and is a certified veterinary technician.