Showing articles associated with Alexander J Mentzer
I am an Infectious Disease doctor working at the John Radcliffe Hospital and a Group Leader at the Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics in the University of Oxford.
What is your main area(s) of interest/expertise?
I am involved in the recruitment and blood sampling of people with a number of infections including COVID both during their acute illness and during their recovery. I am particularly interested in trying to understand why some people get so unwell with infection whereas others remain protected and suffer very few symptoms. My group uses a range of cutting edge techniques including genetic and gene expression analyses to determine whether our genetics influence our immune responses so that we can use this information to develop better vaccines, drugs and tests in our fight against infectious disease.
What are you working on right now?
Together with a huge number of collaborators I am working to 1) collect samples from patients in hospital and in the community with COVID that can be used for genetic, gene expression and immunological experiments 2) using these samples to undertake immunological experiments including tests of antibody responses and 3) measuring gene expression and genetic variation in these samples to understand how these responses are all associated with human genetics.
Why is Oxford a good place to work in this field of research?
We are very lucky in Oxford to have a huge number of people working at the frontiers of their fields of expertise who can work together to answer important questions relating to coronavirus. Personally I feel very lucky to be able to work aside experts in the fields of immunology, computer science, public health and vaccinology (to name a few) who can help guide and collaborate to make fast, effective insights into COVID that should help many people in the future.
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