Who are you a fellow for?
I am currently funded by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship studying an intracellular bacterium called Wolbachia.
When did you start your fellowship?
March 2019.
What were you doing prior to your fellowship?
My Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship has allowed me to continue the work which I have started as a FEBS (Federation of European Biochemical Societies) Fellow at the Institute of Infection, Veterinary and Ecological Sciences. These two consecutive fellowships have provided me with an opportunity to develop a challenging (and therefore requiring more than two years of funding) project. Before coming to Liverpool, I was an EMBO Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin, Germany.
Why did you choose to undertake your fellowship with the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences?
Liverpool in general and the Institute of Infection, Veterinary and Ecological Sciences in particular are known for being excellent places to study host-microbe interactions and molecular mechanisms of symbiosis.
How does Marie Skłodowska-Curie fund your work?
I am supported by a generous salary and some research and training costs (~ £25 000) are also covered.
What do you study/ what is the aim of your research?
My research aims at developing novel methods to study the best organism in the world – an intracellular bacterium called Wolbachia! It is an antiviral bacterium, able to protect insects from pathogens, including dengue or Zika viruses. Mosquitoes with Wolbachia are currently on field trials to protect humans from the virus-caused disease (if mosquitoes do not carry pathogens, they cannot transmit them to humans). Current data suggest that the incidence of dengue decreases in areas where Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes were released, which makes my research even more exciting!
What inspired you to look at this field?
I was always interested in host-microorganism interactions. The numerous tricks the microorganisms use to colonize animals, and animal’s ways to tame these little friends or invaders have always fascinated me. When I have heard what Wolbachia can do, I immediately thought that I have to know how it does it!