2023 Symposium recap
The 2023 CeZAP Infectious Disease Research Symposium was held on Friday, Oct. 6 from 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. at The Inn at Virginia Tech. This year’s symposium was a shining success as throughout the whole day we heard from incredible speakers and learned quite a bit about numerous infectious disease topics. We are glad to say that our second annual research symposium has left us reeled and ready for the next!
This year’s symposium was kicked off with welcoming remarks from Kylene Kehn-Hall (Director of CeZAP), Randy Heflin (Senior Associate Vice President, Research and Innovation), and Aimée M. Surprenant (Dean of the Graduate School); as well as an ID IGEP introduction from the Co-directors, Ann Stevens, Kevin Edgar, and Jonathan Auguste. They were glad to announce how well ID IGEP is doing as they have recently welcomed a new class of cohorts as well as the previous cohorts excelling in their research. The interdisciplinary graduate program in infectious disease (ID IGEP) aims to advance their student’s scientific perspectives by providing them with opportunities to explore different transdisciplinary research methods in numerous colleges and departments.
After the warm welcomes, we dove into the first keynote speaker of the day, Pejman Rohani, a Regents' Professor from the University of Georgia, who came to speak about his research titled “Early warning systems for disease (re)emergence.” Rohani discussed theories and statisitcs of how to tell when a disease wil be re-emerging as well as how to project the current epidemic transition information. As the day went on we heard from the other keynote speakers, Linsey Marr, a Charles P. Lunsford Professor and University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering here at Virginia Tech, who spoke about her work titled “Airborne Disease Transmission from 6 Feet to 6 Million Feet”; followed by Colleen B. Jonsson, a Van Vleet Chair of Excellence in Virology from the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, who discussed her research titled “Novel brain-penetrant antivirals for Venezuelan and eastern equine encephalitis.” Each keynote speaker left the audience enthralled with their work and thankful the speakers were able to highlight the day with their brilliant work.
As the day carried on, we heard from over 90 faculty, postdoc and student speakers about their work on topics ranging from data on pandemic outbreaks, foreign viruses, and other infectious disease research studies. These oral and poster presentations fall under CeZAP’s 11 thematic areas. Lastly, the symposium concluded with a social providing the opportunity for continued disccussions and connecting with faculty and students in CeZAP.
Overall, the day was full of exquisite learning opportunties as we got the chance to hear from many CeZAP affiliates as well as renowned guests about their work. It's safe to say that this year's symposium was yet another triumphant event, and we are looking forward to our next annual symposium and what it may bring.
Written by Anna Barker