“Bioinformatics is fundamental to modern scientific research, including in our fight against infectious diseases”
HKU-Pasteur celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, it is the occasion to show you a little bit more about the people who make this lab a major research pole on infectious diseases, an innovative teaching center and a very special place for us all.
Today, meet Dr Vijay Dhanasekaran, Principal Investigator at HKU-Pasteur Research Pole whose research applies computational and experimental methods at the intersection of medicine, epidemiology and population genetics to identify factors that shape the emergence and evolution of rapidly evolving pathogens:
“I believe the HKU-Pasteur Research Pole is an ideal place for my research owing to its long tradition in studying host-pathogen interactions of emerging respiratory pathogens and its growing focus on antimicrobial resistance.
Its location within the HKU School of Public Health provides a unique opportunity to conduct infectious disease research combining laboratory, field and computational sciences.
Even though I am not a bioinformatician technically, I am something of a computational biologist who uses computers to study infectious diseases.
In my view bioinformatics is fundamental to modern scientific research, including in our fight against infectious diseases.
As we have seen throughout 2020, when SARS-CoV-2 emerged and spread globally, computational scientists working with laboratory and clinical scientists in several areas, including virology, epidemiology and immunology, have developed a number of invaluable methods and tools to diagnose infections, monitor the virus’s evolution and spread, and develop control measures against the virus.”
To know more about the research he conducts at HKU-Pasteur and other researchers from the Pole, browse the HKU-Pasteur Research Pole 20th Anniversary Book, 60 pages tracing back 20 years of research, teaching, activities and more!