Infection

The ICH Infection section specialises in research into high consequence infectious diseases.

The section's main aim is to undertake research that increases our understanding of the diagnosis, transmission and management of bacterial, viral, fungal and parasitic disease, immunity, and the development and function of the immune system. The section hosts a wide-ranging portfolio of national and international research projects. Principal investigators in the section lead clinical trials of new therapeutics, global epidemiological investigation of infectious diseases as well as studies of antimicrobial resistance, host-pathogen interaction, the microbiome, immunology, and critical care. 

Our laboratories across ICH and the Zayed Centre for Research enable advanced high throughput pathogen sequencing, work with category 3 level organisms and the quantification of drug efficacy with combination therapies in a state-of-the-art hollow fibre system.

Globally the section has close links and active research collaborations with the Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) South Africa, Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (Lima, Peru) and is one of the international leads on the Gates' funded LAKANA study of mass drug administration in Mali. Locally, the section is currently leading the AMR-DC study ("Antimicrobial Resistance in Death Certification), a nationwide epidemiological study aiming to determine the total burden of antimicrobial resistance on mortality in England.

The section comprises basic and clinical scientists, ranging from laboratory research assistants, MSc students, PhD students, post-doctoral researchers, consultants and professors in Infectious Diseases, Microbiology, Virology and Immunology who work together to lead a diverse range of research groups.

CENTRI: We have recently launched CENTRI (The Centre for Evaluation and Treatment of Resistant Infection). CENTRI combines expertise in infectious diseases, microbiology, pharmacometrics and pharmacology to provide advice and testing for highly resistant organisms. This centre is now open to a) clinical referrals and b) sample referrals.

Antenatal CMV Evaluation of Screening (ACES) is a collaborative research study sponsored by UCLH, funded by UCLH Charity and led by Dr Heather Bailey at IGH and Professor Eleni Nastouli at GOS ICH. The main aim of this pilot implementation study is to assess the feasibility and acceptability of cytomegalovirus (CMV) screening in the antenatal population at UCLH. We will conduct a seroprevalence study between UCLH and NMUH (Prof A Geretti) and national/international surveys on the clinical management of CMV in pregnancy (Dr N. Surabhi, GSTT and Prof A. Khalil, SGUL) as well as the diagnostic algorithms (Dr E. Sanchez, UCLH Dr E. Alexander, Bart’s Health, Dr P Randell, ICL).  There are nested sub-studies assessing the predictive value of biological markers and evaluation of novel diagnostics in collaboration with colleagues at UCL (Dr M. Reeves and Prof R. McKendry) and Hadassah University (Prof D. Wolf).

Principal Investigators

• Bushra Ahmed
• Paul Aurora (Honorary)
• Mona Bajaj-Elliott
• Alasdair Bamford (Honorary)
• Judith Breuer
• Tessa Crompton
• David Goldblatt
• Louis Grandjean
• Nigel Klein
• Eleni Nastouli (Honorary)
• Chris O’Callaghan
• Mark Peters
• Claire Smith
• Ros Smyth
• Joe Standing