Characterising the human virome in febrile patients

We hypothesise that clinically important viruses are circulating, undetected, in developing countries and contributing to the burden of infectious disease.I am analysing the viromes from cohorts of febrile patients from Ecuador and Sierra Leone, firstly through screening with pathogen-specific RT-PCR assays and secondly using a metagenomic approach to detect novel or unexpected virus sequences. Analysis of cytokine responses to stimulation by the identified viruses will provide valuable information about the host response to emerging viruses.