Luis Martinez-Sobrido Laboratory
Dr. Martinez-Sobrido’s lab aims to develop vaccines and antivirals that can be long-lasting for viral infections in humans.
Dr. Martinez-Sobrido’s lab is interested in the molecular biology, immunology, and pathogenesis of negative-strand and positive-strand RNA, and DNA viruses. Likewise, Dr. Martinez-Sobrido’s lab aims to develop prophylactic vaccines and therapeutic antivirals that can be long-lasting for the treatment of viral infections in humans and animals. The team also uses the maximum containment biosafety level 4 (BSL-4) laboratory to safely study pathogens responsible of causing hemorrhagic fever disease in humans.
Dr. Martinez-Sobrido is widely recognized for his expertise in generating recombinant viruses, specifically influenza, paramyxovirus, arenaviruses, coronavirus, and Zika virus, using plasmid-based reverse genetic approaches. He also developed plasmid-, cellular- and virus-based assays to identify virus-encoded interferon antagonist proteins that have helped to uncover the molecular mechanisms involved in viral pathogenesis.
Current Research
The Martinez-Sobrido laboratory focuses on:
- Development of reverse genetics approaches for RNA and DNA viruses
- Characterization of viral infections in vitro and in vivo
- Study virus-host interactions
- Understand mechanism(s) of viral pathogenicity
- Animal models of viral infections
- Development of live-attenuated vaccines for the prophylactic treatment of viral infections
- Identification and characterization of novel therapeutic antivirals
- Identification of neutralizing antibodies for the prophylactic and/or therapeutic treatment of viral infections
- In vitro and in vivo imaging systems
- Molecular virology
- Viral innate and adaptive immune responses
- Development of universal vaccines and antivirals
- High containment biosafety level 3 and 4.