Amy Bei, PhD

Dr. Bei’s research interests in Plasmodium – the causative agent of malaria - lie at the intersection between population genetics, genomics, molecular genetics, epidemiology, and immunology. Her current research uses a translational systems biology approach to study the impact of antigenic diversity on immune evasion, transmission, and virulence in setting of declining malaria transmission. She is studying the development of genotype-specific and genotype-transcendent immunity and assess the effect of specific persisting genotypes on neutralizing humoral immune responses and their transmission potential in the mosquito vector. She also works on malaria vaccine candidate discovery and validation, studying the functional consequences of naturally arising diversity. Dr. Bei has ongoing research projects in Senegal in addition to many active collaborations in Sub-Saharan African countries in both East and West Africa.