Silvia Vidal

The mission of the Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Pathogenesis of Infection and Inflammation is to develop mouse genetic platforms to discover and functionally characterize the molecular interface between pathogenic viruses, inflammation and immunity. Susceptibility phenotypes are studied using deep immunophenotyping, global transcriptomics and gain/loss of function experiments. A focus of research is the characterization of mechanisms of self/non-self discrimination by NK cells during viral infection and pathways that control inflammatory responses during coxsackieviral myocarditis and influenza pneumonia. More recently, her lab is working on a new knock-in human ACE2 model for biomedical research, the role of NK cells in COVID-19 and the study of SARS-CoV-2 evolution in immunocompromised models.