Current Team
Dr Matthew Reeves
Principal Investigator
Associate Professor of Molecular Virology
Matthew trained with Profs. John Sinclair and Patrick Sissons at the University of Cambridge before leaving for the States on a Presidential Fellowship to work with Prof. Teresa Compton at Novartis in Cambridge, MA. He returned to the UK and Cambridge with the support of a prestigious MRC Career Development Fellowship and subsequently transferred that to UCL in 2013 where he established his laboratory in the CMV research group based in Institute of Immunity & Transplantation. Although his consistent focus has been the molecular basis of HCMV latency and reactivation he remains interested how the virus manipulates the host cell in all phases of infection and why our immune system controls but does not sterilise HCMV infections.
Megan McIntosh
Research Techician
Megan graduated with a BSc in Applied Biomedical Science (2013) from the University of the West of England, during a sandwich year she completed HCPC Biomedical Training. This developed her curiosity for analytical techniques in biomedicine which motivated her to take on the position of Technician at St Mary's Core Flow Cytometry Facility, Imperial College London. From here Megan's interest in infection & immunity deepened which moved her to take a Research Technician role with the National Heart & Lung Institute researching COPD and the role of macrophages. Megan has recently joined the CMV group and the Reeves lab as a Research Technician on the CMV in transplant natural history study, this has introduced her to the world of Virology and particularly sparked her interest in how HCMV masterfully evades the immune system.
Dr Claire Atkinson
Project Manager
Claire is the Project Manager on the Wellcome Trust Collaborative Grant. Claire has expertise in diagnostic virology which she honed through many years service to the NHS. Claire maintained her interests in the application of this knowledge to research and was awarded her PhD by UCL for her studies under the guidance of Paul Griffiths.
Dr Calum Forrest
Post Doctoral Researcher
Calum trained in Birmingham with Alan Rickinson FRS where he studied the breadth of the immune response to EBV antigens obtaining his PhD in 2016. Calum then joined the Institute and the laboratory of Ron Chakraverty to work on lentiviral delivery systems in cancer for a year. After a brief hiatus at Imperial he rejoined the Institute and our lab where he will work on the role of innate and adaptive immune responses in the control of HCMV infection following organ transplant. Calum is also in charge of the lab tyre collection.
Dr Stephanie Chong
Clinical PhD student
Stephanie is a Specialist Registrar in Nephrology who is interested in viral factors that promote Kidney disease and graft rejection in transplant patients.
Stephanie was also a Clinical Lecturer during which time she generated the pilot data for her successful PhD Studentship application. Stephanie will be supported by the Royal Free Charity to investigate the role of BK polyoma virus in kidney disease. This is an exciting collaboration between ourselves and the Division of Renal Medicine and seeks to shed new light on an increasingly important medical problem.
Rebecca Mason
Royal Free Charity PhD student
Becky is a full on UCL graduate after studying for a Biochemstry BSc and then an MSc in Infection & Immunity. Becky originally was an MSc project student in the lab studying the mechanisms of viral gene regulation during lytic infection.
Becky has been awarded a Royal Free Charity bursary to study for a PhD investigating the molecular control of viral gene expression during latency and reactivation.
Ines Hofer
BBSRC LiDO PhD student
Ines joins the lab in a collaborative project with Radu Zabet at QMUL. Ines hails from Austria and joins the lab with a background in forensic science.
She will be working on a project that combines bioinformatics, systems biology approaches to the study of chromatin conformation and virology to understand the fundamental principles governing haematopoietic cell fate and how a virus may help understand this.
Ana Lankina
BBSRC LiDO PhD Student
Ana joins the lab as a joint PhD student with Judy Breuer and will combine in silico approaches with wet lab experimentation to understand the importance of gB domains for infection and immune control.
Ana hails from Russia and thus feels none of us really know what cold is! We have yet to establish whether Ana likes vodka or not. This seems an oversight on our part...
Ellie Bradley
Research Technician
Ellie joined us for 6 months initially to support our ongoing work trying to understand the host immune responses important for the control of HCMV reactivation in solid organ transplant recipients. Ellie has since be allowed to stay longer as she is an integral part of the Pub Quiz winning team!
Ellie previously was a student on our MSc course and joined us after graduating from that and makes the move from bacteria to virology to finish off all the papers that are hanging around the lab!
Aisha Fakhroo
PhD student - Qatar Embassy Scholarship
Aisha re-joins the lab after her MSc project to continue her work on HCMV reactivation and, specifically, to investigate the molecular mechanisms that control reactivation in dendritic cells.
Aisha is sponsored by a Qatar Embassy Scholarship and it appears will be bringing dates (the food not escorts!) to the lab on a regular basis.