News

Weldon Prize for SPI-M-O and Zeeman modellers

Matt Keeling and Louise Dyson were part of the Warwick Zeeman team invited to attend the Weldon Prize giving in Oxford.

This prize is awarded annually for ‘noteworthy contributions to the development of mathematical or statistical methods applied to problems in Biology’. This year it was given to the SPI-M-O group (part of SAGE) in recognition for their work during the COVID-19 pandemic. The awards committee said "Under great pressure to deliver results quickly, and under immense public scrutiny, SPI-M-O both built on existing science and developed new epidemiological and statistical techniques to understand the spread of the virus and how it might be controlled. The importance of good and timely disease modelling for policymakers has never been as clear."

Wed 16 Nov 2022, 17:25

SBIDER Seminars

There is one thing that I want to bring to everyone's attention. SBIDER Seminars will return on Monday 26th in the Oculus (2-3, with lunch 1-2). The first talk will be by Anna Seale (WMS) - Anna did some fantastic work as part of UKHSA during the pandemic, but will be telling us about the control of Group A Strep in Africa - an interest that will see her move to work for BMGF shortly.

Other upcoming talks are:

Timothy Saunders, 10th October,
Kris Parag, 24th October
Susana Gomes, 31st October
Joe Hilton, 7th November
Stephen Parnell, 14th November
Michelle Kendall, 21st November
Helen Wilson, 28th November
Marya Bazzi, 5th December

This means we have spaces on 3rd and 17th October - volunteers please !!

Mon 19 Sept 2022, 11:20

Bumper News

Hi All,

Given I've been away for 2-weeks, and then not posted the news to this feed last week -- this week's news is a bumper edition. Lots of things to report:

1) In some great news, I'm happy to report that Sam Moore will be moving to a Lectureship in Lancaster from November. Sam's work on vaccination during the COVID outbreak has been superb, with massive impact - helping to set UK policy. He will be greatly missed, but I hope many of us will keep collaborating.

2) Other terrific news is that Robin Thompson is now a Dad. His daughter Lily was born on 30th July - massive congratulations to Robin & Rebecca.

3) We are planning to re-start SBIDER seminars on Mondays at 2-3pm, when term begins. Suki has already booked us a room in the Oculus, and there is space for lunch beforehand (1-2). For this coming term, we thought it would be easier to pick from the wealth of researchers in Warwick - probably alternating between SBIDER and non-SBIDER people. Please can you either

(i) send me & Suki suggestions for non-SBIDER talks (person's name & email and even subject area would be good) and volunteers from SBIDER; or

(ii) put the details on the google spread-sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15Lv1fVB_eaulmHn8wz9JEt-PTgd7x63I1a8pWntETUI/edit?usp=sharing

4) Erin reports that Tino Pori, one of her phd students, has just received a grant from the Medical and Life Sciences research fund for "Rift Valley fever virus at a wildlife-livestock interface: what role do African buffalo play in virus circulation?". He will start trapping mosquitoes and testing cattle and wildlife for infection starting this winter.

5) Not content with one bit of good news, Robin has also just won his first main PI grant. The funding is from the Wellcome Trust for "The impact of climate variability on infectious disease epidemic risks", which will employ a PDRA from January 2023 -- talk to Robin or Matt if you know someone with strong computer skills that might be interested.

6) The latest SBIDER Careers Podcast has just been released. Ed & Laura chatted with Suki - really informative and entertaining:

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-n9eed-12a0554Link opens in a new window

7) There has been a bumper crop of papers while I've been away (2 from me, 2 from Robin and 3 from Xavier!):

Kaye, AR; Hart, WS; Bromiley, J; Iwami, S; Thompson, RN (2022) A direct comparison of methods for assessing the threat from emerging infectious diseases in seasonally varying environments JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY 548 111195
Carson, J; Ledda, A; Ferretti, L; Keeling, M; Didelot, X (2022) The bounded coalescent model: Conditioning a genealogy on a minimum root date JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY 548 111186
Hart, WS; Abbott, S; Endo, A; Hellewell, J; Miller, E; Andrews, N; Maini, PK; Funk, S; Thompson, RN (2022) Inference of the SARS-CoV-2 generation time using UK household data ELIFE 11 e70767
Volk, D; Yang-Turner, F; Didelot, X; Crook, DW; Wyllie, D (2022) Catwalk: identifying closely related sequences in large microbial sequence databases MICROBIAL GENOMICS 8 850
Prosser, NS; Green, MJ; Ferguson, E; Tildesley, MJ; Hill, EM; Keeling, MJ; Kaler, J (2022) Cattle farmer psychosocial profiles and their association with control strategies for bovine viral diarrhea JOURNAL OF DAIRY SCIENCE 105 3559-3573
Orangi, S et al. (2022) Epidemiological impact and cost-effectiveness analysis of COVID-19 vaccination in Kenya BMJ GLOBAL HEALTH 7 e009430
Willgert, K; Didelot, X; Surendran-Nair, M; Kuchipudi, SV; Ruden, RM; Yon, M; Nissly, RH; Vandegrift, KJ; Nelli, RK; Li, LL; Jayarao, BM; Levine, N; Olsen, RJ; Davis, JJ; Musser, JM; Hudson, PJ; Kapur, V; Conlan, AJK (2022) Transmission history of SARS-CoV-2 in humans and white-tailed deer. SCIENTIFIC REPORTS 12 12094
Kamau, A; Musau, M ; Mwakio, S; Amadi, D; Nyaguara, A; Bejon, P; Seale, AC ; Berkley, JA; Snow, RW (2022) Impact of Intermittent Presumptive Treatment for Malaria in Pregnancy on Hospital Birth Outcomes on the Kenyan Coast. CLINICAL INF. DIS. 10.1093/cid/ciac509
Prosser, NS; Hill, EM; Armstrong, D; Gow, L; Tildesley, MJ; Keeling, MJ; Kaler, J; Ferguson, E; Green, MJ (2022) Descriptive analysis of national bovine viral diarrhoea test data in England (2016-2020). VET. RECORD e1854
Agoti, CN; Ochola-Oyier, LI; Dellicour, S (2022) Transmission networks of SARS-CoV-2 in Coastal Kenya during the first two waves: A retrospective genomic study. ELFE 11 e71703

Fri 19 Aug 2022, 16:25