2023-05-04 18:09:09
(Vienna, 04 May 2023) – Judith Aberle took up the professorship for viral immunology (§99 (1)) at MedUni Vienna on 1 May 2023. The virologist heads a research group at MedUni Vienna’s Center for Virology that deals with the specific immune responses in viral infections and vaccinations.
Her scientific work focuses on investigating the immune response in flavivirus infections. Flaviviruses are transmitted by ticks or mosquitoes and cause diseases such as tick-borne encephalitis (TBE), West Nile fever, Zika or dengue fever. Judith Aberle and her team were able to decode the regions in the flavivirus envelope proteins (West Nile, Zika, yellow fever, TBE viruses) that are relevant for recognition by T cells and analyzed the role of the antigen structure in epitope selection. In this context, her team also studied genetic and other host-specific factors with the aim of better understanding why some people become seriously ill and others do not. Another focus, which is closely linked to other research areas of the center, is medical virus diagnostics and the epidemiology of TBE in Austria.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Judith Aberle’s working group has been addressing the question of how viral mutations affect immunity and protection once morest disease. This work was carried out in close collaboration with other research groups at the Center for Virology and has contributed significantly to the understanding of the immune escape properties of SARS-CoV-2. Together with other research groups, Judith Aberle is also examining other respiratory viruses in order to investigate the interaction of previously unknown mutation dynamics and the immune system. The research group is part of a network of cooperation partners at MedUni Vienna clinics and centers as well as national and international cooperation partners. In this environment, essential insights into the immune response in COVID-19 vaccinations, especially in immunosuppressed patients, might be gained.
To person
Judith Aberle studied human medicine at the Medical Faculty of the University of Vienna and was a guest student at the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa. She is a specialist in virology and became an associated professor at MedUni Vienna in 2011. In 2022/2023 she worked as part of a corona research project at Tulane University in the USA. She heads the Austrian reference center for HIV and medical ARBO virus diagnostics and works as an expert for the Federal Ministry for Social Affairs, Health, Care and Consumer Protection and in several international committees. Judith Aberle has been deputy director of the Center for Virology since 2022.
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