"The study of emerging zoonotic diseases in the bench and the field"

About:

Approximately 70% of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) for humans are zoonoses with single-strand RNA (ssRNA) viruses being a particularly important causative group due to their ability to adapt to new hosts and environments. Some examples include Ebola (EBOV) and Marburg (MARV) virus, Nipah, Hendra, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (MERS-CoV), severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and possibly SARS-CoV2. In our laboratory, we combine ecological studies in bats with the evaluation of virus pathogenesis in xenochimeric mice. The use of specific host-like environment models provides a new in vivo platform that can contribute to elucidating the pathogenic potential and the specific initial host immune responses of newly discovered or uncharacterized viruses.

Bio:

Beatriz Escudero did her PhD at École Normale Supérieure, Lyon (France). She did a post-doctoral stay at Adolfo-García-Sastre lab at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. She is a team leader of the WHO consultant in Guinea during the Ebola virus crisis and BSL4 deputy director. Since 2020 she is a Junior Group leader of the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF) at Bernhard-Nocht-Institut für Tropenmedizin. Her lab is trying to understand the pathogenesis of different emerging viral infections.

Hosted by PI Carmen Rivas (Virus & Cancer Group)

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