Infectious Disease Epidemiology

The Infectious Disease Epidemiology (IDE) Laboratory offers an excellent interdisciplinary environment where experimentalists work closely with computational experts utilizing state-of-the-art genomic technologies. We ask fundamental questions on how bacterial phenotypes are determined by their genotypes in natural settings. We therefore utilize a broad range of high-throughput genomic and phenomic technologies to obtain whole genome sequencing of clinical and environmental bacterial strains and their key clinical phenotypes under various conditions. We then employ computational methods, in particular machine learning methods, to integrate the phenome and genome data with the goal of reconstructing the genotype-phenotype map and identifying robust causative and informative genomic biomarkers.

Our research is focused on the evolution and epidemiology of infectious diseases, especially in the context of antimicrobial resistance. We  utilise a broad range of genomic, phenomic and machine learning approaches to understand the dissemination of pathogens within and between environmental and clinical settings and to pinpoint genetic factors driving the evolution of pathogens. Moreover, we employ machine learning approaches for predicting bacterial complex phenotypic features, e.g. bacterial growth, antimicrobial resistance, and horizontal gene transfer, from genomic variants.

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Establishment of

IDE lab

The IDE lab has been established at KAUST. We are part of the KAUST Smart-Health initiative.  The lab is located on level 4 of building 2. Danesh Moradigaravand is the director of the lab. His office is located in building 3, room 4336. 

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