Members directory

Vector born disease

I am based in Cali, Colombia, and employed part time by CIDEIM and part time by LSHTM.  I work largely on dengue, leishmaniasis, lymphatic filariasis and other parasitic and vector-borne diseases.

I previously worked at the Papua New Guinea Institute of Medical Research, and the Ahmadu Bello University in Kaduna, Nigeria (seconded from the Institute of Ophthalmology, London).

In 1998 I completed a PhD supervised by Bryan Grenfell in the Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge entitled 'Heterogeneity and the Epidemiology of Lymphatic Filariasis'. I also have a BA in Mathematics and a Diploma in Mathematical Statistics from the same university.

Sand flies, mosquitoes, population genetic, population ecology, geometric morphometrics, parasite and virus detection, vector control

Vector-Borne Viral diseases

Epidemiology, Biology, Vector Potential

Interested with vector Borne Disease mainly (Mosquitoes,Sand fly) and their interaction with diseases, Molecular biology and Bioinformatic. 

Medical Entomology and Parasitology of Tropical Diseases;

- Development of new vector control tools

- Insecticide resistance mechanism and vector control management;

- Molecular Biology and Biomarker development;

- Adaptation and evolution of insect genomes;

- Research and teaching

*Biology, ecology, molecular studies, and control of Blackflies and mosquitoes.

-Developing molecular markers for species identification of members of Simulium damnosum s.l.

-Identification of members of the S. damnosum complex using Cytotaxonomy 

-Blackflies population studies using molecular (genetic) and cytogenetic (cytotaxonomy) approaches.

-Control of blackflies, vectors of onchocerciasis, through larviciding and other non-chemical methods like 'slash and clear'.

-Control of disease vectors using emerging genetic biocontrol technologies like gene drives. 

-Transmission assessment of filariasis transmission (onchocerciasis and lymphatic filariasis) by xenomintoring.

-Insecticide susceptibility studies in mosquitoes and blackflies.

I am interested in research in the field of the vector borne zoonotic disease, especially Rift Valley Fever and blue tongue disease, in addition to other research interests.

Briefly I am interested in;

Infection and global health 

One health (infectious diseases)

Socio-economic impacts of diseases 

Veterinary epidemiology 

Zoonoses and animal health surveillance

Biology of Culicoides

My research focuses on the ecology and evolution of host parasites interactions, vector biology and life history theory. One of my main interest is in carry over effects, namely the evolutionary consequences of early life environment and maternal investments.

I joined a BBSRC project where my focus is on evolutionary modeling of maternal investments in tsetse flies and how that may impact vector competence and the epidemiology of the African Animal Trypanosomiasis. In this project my approach is theoretical and it is in collaboration with colleagues in charge of field work in Zimbabwe and lab studies in Liverpool (LSTM).

I have worked previously on the malaria system, from ecology & evolution of mosquito immunity (PhD), to combining evolutionary & applied ecology to improve malaria control (postdoc) in the Eave tubes project with field work in West Africa, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Ecology, Taxonomy and Management of Medical Important Pests 

I am a medical Entomologist and Professor of the Department of Zoology of a public university, Jahangirnagar University. I am working on medical important pest in Bangladesh. I am interested to do work on sand fly vector(s).

Romeo Bellini (Ph.D. in Entomology at the University of Bologna) is currently covering the position of Director of the Medical & Veterinary Entomology Dept. at the Centro Agricoltura Ambiente “G.Nicoli” (http://www.caa.it). He is the scientific responsible for the IAEA Collaborating Centre established in the 2012 at the CAA. He recently (2014) obtained the Italian national qualification of full Professor in Plant Pathology & Entomology. He has 30 years of experience in mosquito ecology studies and management of mosquito control programs in Italy. He has been coordinator of the EU-LIFE program 1994-’96 "Environmental friendly management of tourist areas on the Emilia-Romagna Riviera” and WP 10 leader in the FP7 Infrastructure project “Research capacity for the implementation of genetic control of mosquitoes-INFRAVEC”. Currently he is in charge of supervising and coordinating laboratory and field activities of a team of 7 full-time and 5 part-time technicians. He is author of 98 referred scientific publications and 69 other publications; 62 oral and 64 poster presentations in international scientific meetings. He is serving as a peer reviewer for Acta Tropica, Bulletin of Entomological Research, Journal of Medical Entomology, Journal of Vector Ecology, Journal of American Mosquito Control Association, Bulletin of Insectology, Medical and Veterinary Entomology, Journal of Applied Ecology, Parasites & Vectors, PLoS Neglected Tropical Disease, Pathogens and Global Health, Vector-Borne and Zoonotic Diseases. He served as a European Director of the Society for Vector Ecology (1998-’99) and the Italian Director of the European Mosquito Control Association (2003-’05). He is member of the most important scientific societies in the field of medical entomology such as AMCA, ESA, SOIPA, SOVE. His scientific interests have been focused on the developing of mosquito and other vectors surveillance and monitoring methods, followed by the implementation of control strategies at low environmental impact and with no sanitary risks. He has been very active in the implementation of biological mosquito control in Italy using Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis formulations and fishes (Gambusia holbrooki, Aphanius fasciatus); in the standardization of reliable mosquito monitoring methods; in testing new products and tools for mosquito control. Following the introduction of Aedes albopictus in Italy (1990) he has been involved in studying the ecology of the species in the new habitats and developing specific control measures including source reduction, larval control, community participation. In the year 2000 he started investigating the application of the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT) against Ae. albopictus. Recently he is also interested in the surveillance and risk assessment of emerging vector borne diseases in Europe. He is providing expertise consultations to international bodies such as World Health Organization (WHO) Europe, European Centre for Diseases Prevention and Control (ECDC), European Food Safety Agency (EFSA), International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Infectious disease ecology and evolution; epidemiology, molecular ecology, vector biology

Working on bluetongue  and Lyme disease among other (mostly non-vector-borne diseases)

My current research interests lie in investigating vector competence for arboviruses. I am particularly interested in the effect of temperature on virus transmission, including the minimum environmental temperature required for transmission, to identify regions at risk from invasive or endemic viruses. I am also interested in the potential for viruses to adapt to different conditions, and consequently, the risk they may pose in the future.

I am fascinated by the biology and ecology of the vectors - their diversity and capacity to transmit varios vector-born disease. My research is mainly focused on faunistic diversity of Culicoides  biting midges and their role in the vector-parasite and vector-host interactions  in the parasite-vector-host system of biting midges, avian haemosporidians and birds.

My long term and current research interests are focused on examining the utility of insect microbes and endosymbionts for disease and vector control.  Much of the current work in my lab is centered around Culicoides and Aedes mosquito systems. 

I am Honorary Assistant Professor at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Head of Development & Partnerships at the university's first biotech spin-out Vecotech Ltd. I lead research developing novel attractant and repellent products for pest arthropods. My research interests lie with increasing the understanding the behavioural biology of pest arthropods and in developing novel surveillance and control tools targeting them.

Surveillance, modelling and prediction of risk and intensity of vector borne disease transmission in time and space

Sand fly species identification

Leishmania

Phlebovirus

Climate change and vector-borne diseases

In my master degree I´m  working with the ecology and epidemiology of sand flies at the County of Pains in Minas Gerais/Brazil, analyzing the fauna of phlebotomineas in seven diferents enviroments (cave, eucalyptus plantation, urban area, rural area, pasture, Native forest, and  lime mining), after I´ll make molecular identification of leishmania and  geoprocessing analysis with the data

Biting Midges

Culicoides paraensis

Culicoides insingnis

Oropouche Virus

Ecology of Sand fly population

Epidemiology of vector borne diseases, Ecology of arthropod vectors, integrated vector management 

Disease ecology

Avian pathogens

Blackflies systematics, identification, ecology, epidemiology. 

My work has had a broad impact on the establishment of new genomic model species to complement those (e.g., Saccharomyces, Drosophila, Caenorhabditis, Mus) that have transformed our understanding of the human condition by laboratory studies, yet now chosen because of a deeper understanding of their ecologies, and a greater ability to sample and study genetic variants within their natural populations. These include the waterfea Daphnia (Colbourne et al. 2011 Science 331: 555-561), the jewel wasp Nasonia (Werren et al. 2010 Science 327:343-348), the green anole lizard Anolis (Alföldi et al. 2011 Nature 477:587-591) and the brown planthopper Nilaparvata (Zhang et al. 2014 Genome Biology 15:521). Other vertebrates include the killifish Fundulus (Reid et al. 2017 Genome Biology and Evolution 9:659-676), the songbird Junco and a growing list of emerging invertebrate model species including bee, black fly, aphid, tick, mosquito (Tormey et al. 2015 BMC Genomics 16:754) and amphipod (Poynton et al. 2018 Environmental Science and Technology 52:6009-6022). This work resulted in Daphnia's designation as a biomedical model species by the US National Institutes of Health.

Studies that focused on these new model species are producing the broad range of anticipated discoveries that would be difficult to achieve otherwise; many are suggesting that variation among the co-regulated networks of genes are better predictors than gene variation of the adaptive potential of populations to survive environmental stress (Reid et al. 2016 Science 354:1305-1308), of the mechanisms that confer insecticide resistances in arthropods (Weston et al. 2013 PNAS 110:16532), of the mechanistic basis of environmentally induced phenotypic plastic traits (Shaw et al. 2014 Molecular Biology and Evolution 31:3002-3015), and the evolutionary basis of the vector biology of mosquitos (Bradshaw et al. 2017 PNAS 115:1009-1014).

Culicoides biting midges as arbovirus vectors in domestic livestock.

Vector-borne disease epidemiology

vector control

zoonoses

public health and veterinary health

intervention trials

vector and animal behavioural ecology

My main area of interest is the application of molecular methods to field settings in order to investigate the biology of vectors.

Sand flies and Leishmania

Culicoides-borne pathogens of veterinary importance; host-vector-pathogen interface; role of insect saliva on pathogen dissemination and virulence; host immune responses to insect blood-feeding and insect saliva

Ecology of Biting Midges, Trap development and artificial feeding techniques.

MALDIID specialises in the identification of micro-organism ranging from bacteria, yeast and fungi to insects by using MALDI-TOF MS. For more information visit www.maldiid.com

Biting midges (Culicoides)