The small figure and subtle mannerisms of Dr David Ho Da-i belie the impact the Chinese-American virologist has had on AIDS research.
Dr Ho, a modest man, is credited for his work with combination therapy, a mixture of drugs that attacks the HIV virus in the beginning stages, before the virus can tackle the immune system.
But Dr Ho, 45, makes it clear that his ground-breaking work was made possible because of past and present researchers.
He left Taiwan for the United States with his younger brother and mother at the age of 12 to join his father, who had moved there eight years earlier.
The family first settled in Los Angeles; Dr Ho later attended colleges in Massachusetts and California before being accepted at Harvard.
Through his research, the basic assumption that the HIV virus slumbered in the early stages of infection was exploded.
