Co-heads
Senior Principal Fellow, Associate Professor David Anderson, BSc(Hons), PhD
Senior Fellow, Dr Elizabeth Grgacic, BSc, MScPrelim, PhD
Senior Research Officers:
Dr Teresa Howard, BSc(Hons), PhD
Ms Mary Garcia, Dip Lab Tech
Research Officer
Dr Jakub Chojnacki, PhD
PhD students
Dr Purnima Bhat, MBBS, FRACP
Ms Natalie Counihan, BAppSc Hons (RMIT)
Research Assistants
Ms Simone van de Waarsenburg BSc
Ms Jocelyn Diaz, BSc
Research Overview
The Ian Potter Hepatitis research Laboratory has had a major interest in the structure, replication and assembly of three of the major hepatitis viruses (hepatitis B, hepatitis A and hepatitis E) for many years, with the long-term goals of using this increased understanding for improved control of disease through vaccines, diagnostics and antivirals. In the course of our development of rapid, point-of-care tests for hepatitis E and hepatitis A infection, we have developed unique expertise for development of tests against a range of acute viral and bacterial diseases, in a continuing partnership with Select Vaccines Ltd. These tests allow the diagnosis of patient disease using a finger prick sample of blood within 10-15 min, with minimal training and no equipment, and are especially useful in resource-poor or emergency settings. This expertise has also provided part of the background research for our work on a new point-of-care test for monitoring of CD4 T-cell numbers in HIV-infected patients, in collaboration with Suzanne Crowe and Robyn Lloyd (Burnet) and Alan Landay (Rush University, Chicago).
Research Objectives
• Understanding the assembly and disassembly of hepatitis B virus
• Identifying the interactions of hepatitis A virus and hepatitis B virus with polarized epithelial cells
• Development of ELISA and rapid point of care tests, for hepatitis and other significant diseases, including monitoring of CD4 T-cells
Research Highlights
• Identifying the fusion peptide of duck hepatitis B virus, pointing the way to this peptide as a potential target for antiviral drugs against the human hepatitis B virus
• Identifying the mechanisms by which hepatitis B virus can cross the cellular barriers to cause infection, and the first demonstration that hepatitis A virus can also cross these barriers to spread infection
• Development of world-first rapid point-of-care test for acute syphilis infection, and progress towards similar tests for influenza (in collaboration with WHO Influenza Centre) and monitoring of CD4 T-cells (in collaboration with Prof Suzanne Crowe, Burnet, and Prof Alan Landay, Rush University, Chicago)