Look for Lazear Lab members at these upcoming meetings and conferences:
Keystone Symposium on Positive-Sense RNA Viruses (Oct 2024, Killarney, Ireland)
American Society for Virology Conference (July 2025, Montreal, QC)
News
October 2024: Congratulations to Mikhala for passing her qualifying exam and advancing to PhD Candidacy! Stay tuned for all the cool things she's going to discover about no-known-vector flaviviruses!
June 2024: The Lazear Lab had a great time at the American Society for Virology conference hosted by Ohio State University! Drake and Margaret had packed rooms for their presentations and Mikhala had non-stop traffic at her poster!
lazear lab at asv 2024: margaret, mikhala, helen, drake
drake presents at asv 2024
margaret presents at asv 2024
mikhala presents at asv 2024
Drake presented his work investigating the skin-specific effects of IFN-λ in the context of herpes simplex virus infection and the ability of IFN-λ to act through STAT2-independent pathways. Margaret presented her work investigating the protective and pathogenic effects of IFN-λ during congenital Zika virus infection. Mikhala presented her work investigating the virulence and pathogenic phenotypes of no-known-vector flaviviruses.
lazear lab + alumni: tesia, viren, margaret, becca, drake, mikhala, helen
ASV was a great chance to see Lazear Lab alumni, including former UNC undergrads Viren Baharani (grad student, Rockefeller) and Tesia Bobrowski (grad student, Mt. Sinai) and former grad student Becca Casazza (postdoc, Duke).
June 2024: Thanks to Mikhala for arranging a behind-the-scenes tour of the mammalogy collection at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences - we all learned a lot on this field trip!
abbie + an echidna
lazear lab at the nc museum of natural sciences: drake, margaret, celeste, mikhala, abbie, tommy, melissa, alex, helen, nigel, peter
May 2024: At the annual Microbiology & Immunology Department Graduate Program Welcome Ceremony we welcomed the new students joining the M&I PhD program! The new students received gifts from the 3rd year class, donned their new lab coats, and recited their graduate student oath.
A special welcome to Abbie Weight and Celeste Robles who are joining the Lazear Lab! Abbie will be studying arbovirus pathogenesis and how host genetics affects the outcome of infection. Celeste will be studying how neuronal stimuli affect HSV latency and reactivation and how hormonal status affects susceptibility to HSV infection. Look out for cool virology research to come from these two great students!
Congrats to Drake who received the 2024 Manire Award, presented each year to "an outstanding M&I graduate student who is judged to have carried out the most significant and impressive research project during his or her career at UNC" - a well-deserved honor for the great work Drake has done during his PhD.
Drake investigated skin-specific effects of IFN-L, discovering an immunomodulatory mechanism by which IFN-L signals in both neutrophils and keratinocytes to limit the severity of HSV skin lesions. For more details check out his paper in mBio.
Drake also developed a new mouse model for HSV reactivation. This model is very easy and tractable; we're excited to use it to study the effects of IFN-L during recurrent HSV disease, and to investigate the neurobiology of HSV infection. You can find out more in his preprint.
April 2024: The 17th Southeastern Regional Virology Conference was a great opportunity to learn about the outstanding virology research happening throughout our region! Great talks from Drake, Margaret, and Mikhala and fun times with our regional and UNC colleagues at SERVC 2024!
UNc at servc 2024
Drake presenting his research at Servc 2024
margaret presenting her research at servc 2024
mikhala presented her research at servc 2024
unc at the georgia aquarium
lazear lab at the georgia aquarium
