Kristien Van Reeth is a veterinarian and professor of virology at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ghent University, Belgium. Her research group focuses on swine influenza viruses and porcine respiratory coronavirus (PRCV). They use the pig as a natural host and model for human influenza and other viral respiratory infections of humans. Important research topics include the role of the pig in the generation of novel pandemic viruses and more broadly protective vaccines for both swine and humans. 

Juanjuan Guo graduated as a veterinarian from Henan Agricultural University in 2023. Thereafter, she performed research on porcine astrovirus type 5 at the School of Veterinary Medicine (The International Joint Research Center of National Animal Immunology) of Henan Agricultural University. Since January 2024 she is working on the EPIVIR project as a PhD student under the guidance of Prof. Kristien Van Reeth. 

Xander de Haan is associate professor at the Virology Section of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of Utrecht University in the Netherlands. Research of Xander de Haan is particularly focused on the molecular biology of influenza A virus, with an emphasis on the interactions of this virus with sialoside receptors and the consequences thereof for endocytic uptake, tropism and pathogenesis. These virus-receptor interactions are among others being studied using recombinant soluble mimics of the envelope glycoproteins hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) in combination with solid phase binding and cleavage assays as well as by biolayer interferometry, the latter to characterize the functional balance between HA and NA in virus particles. Recently, the interactions of paramyxoviruses with glycan receptors have been added to the research topics. Understanding the dynamic interactions between viruses and their glycan receptors will help us to understand their zoonotic potential and to combat these pathogens.

https://www.uu.nl/staff/CAMdeHaan

Maria Montoya is a staff scientist at the Margarita Salas Centre for Biological research (CIB) belonging to the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC, by its Spanish acronym). She is the head of the Viral Immunology group at CIB. Her scientific trajectory has focused on virus-host interactions from an immunological standpoint, working with various viruses, hosts, and systems. All this information has paved the way for innovative vaccine design. In the COVID-19 pandemic, she was able to apply this accumulated experience to study various aspects of SARS-CoV-2, such as its inflammation mechanisms or designing an S protein-based vaccine at CIB-CSIC. The main objectives of her research group are to study the mechanisms controlling the relationships between RNA viruses, such as influenza or SARS-COV-2 viruses, and the host's innate immune system.  

https://www.cib.csic.es/research/molecular-biomedicine/viral-immunology-therapies-and-vaccines  

Laura Mendoza is a PhD student at the Viral Immunology’s Laboratory. She graduated in Biochemistry at the University of Cordoba and continued her studies with a master's degree in Translational Medicine Research at the Complutense University in Madrid (Spain). She started her scientific career as a research assistant in the viral immunology laboratory, at the Margarita Salas Centre for Biological research (CIB) belonging to CSIC. She is currently working on her PhD entitled “Differential innate immune responses by swIAV, swIDV and PRCV” as part of the EPICVIR project.  

Professor Elma Tchilian is a Head of Mucosal Immunology at the Pirbright Institute She has established a powerful pig influenza model to study immune responses to and transmission of influenza viruses and to test efficacy of novel vaccines and therapeutics. Elma has developed many tools for studying porcine immune responses including peptide MHC tetramers, cell transfers, scintigraphy, porcine influenza specific monoclonal antibodies and has characterised the important tissue resident memory cells in the respiratory tract. More recently Elma’s group developed a porcine respiratory coronavirus model to study acute respiratory coronavirus disease. These studies demonstrate the utility of the pig as a biomedical model for human disease and development of novel control strategies for both human and animal health. 

https://www.pirbright.ac.uk/users/prof-elma-tchilian 

Ashutosh completed his PhD in Animal Biotechnology from ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute in India where he explored strategies to harness innate immunity to enhance adaptive immune response.  In December 2023 he joined the Mucosal Immunology Group in the Pirbright Institute. Ashutosh brings a wealth of expertise in molecular and cellular immunology and will be performing high dimensional profiling of immune responses following influenza or coronavirus infections in pigs as part of the EPICVIR consortium.  

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashutosh-vats-15369379/ 

MCP holds a PhD in Physics from Universidad Complutense de Madrid. He is a member of the Institute for Research in Technology (IIT) and the Interdisciplinary Group of Complex Systems (GISC). MCP has been the Principal Investigator (PI) of six Spanish national research projects and participated in five European projects under Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions and H2020. The central theme of these projects was the application of Complexity theory to model and predict experimental data in Physics, Biology, and Social Sciences. MCP has published his research in prestigious journals such as PNAS, Nature Communications, Physical Review Letters, and Science Translational Medicine. In this sense, most of the research carried out by the MCP has been carried out in collaboration with experimental groups from all over the world, from Immunology to Condensed Matter. MCP has been a visiting researcher at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and a visiting Professor at the University of Leeds (2016-2017). Areas of interest: Statistical Mechanics, Nonlinear Physics, Theoretical Immunology, Bayesian Statistics and Epidemiology.

https://www.iit.comillas.edu/people/marioc

Juan Iribas de la Puerta obtained his degree in Mathematics in 2022 at Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM). In 2023, he completed a Master's in Education at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM). After 6 months of volunteering in The Gambia within an educational framework, he started a job at Comillas University, teaching core Mathematics subjects to Business Management students. As of September 2025, he is a PhD student at the Instituto de Innovación Tecnológica (IIT), where he is developing a thesis on Engineering Systems Modelling.

https://www.iit.comillas.edu/people/jiribas

Martin Lopez-Garcia is an Associate Professor in Applied Mathematics at the School of Mathematics (University of Leeds, UK), working in Mathematical Immunology and Epidemiology. He co-leads the Mathematical Immunology group at Leeds, which develops and calibrates mathematical models to study numerous biological systems related to infection & immunity. During recent years, his research has focused on developing multi-scale models for viral and bacterial infections, as well as to develop computational models to assess infection risk to SARS-CoV-2 during the COVID-19 pandemic. His research is highly interdisciplinary in collaboration with non-academic partners, including the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (UK), the National Health Service (NHS, UK), and the Department for Transport (UK).

https://eps.leeds.ac.uk/maths/staff/4054/dr-martin-lopez-garcia

Grant Lythe works on mathematical T-cell immunology and virology, especially stochastic and computational models.  He coordinated the ETN network ``Quantitative T cell Immunology and Immunotherapy'' and is the UK lead on the EEID US-UK project ``Modelling reassortment at the cellular, clinical, and phylogenetic level in emerging Bunyaviruses``.  Grant Lythe is professor of applied mathematics at the university of Leeds.

https://eps.leeds.ac.uk/maths/staff/4055/professor-grant-lythe

Paula Avello is a Research Fellow in Mathematical Modelling of Infection at the School of Mathematics, University of Leeds. Her research interests lie in the application of mathematical models to validate experiments and/or generate hypotheses, which may be used to inform experimental design. She is currently working on the EPICVIR (Emerging Porcine Influenza and Coronaviruses) project, developing mathematical models to understand viral infection dynamics. Her research areas also include plant circadian rhythms—with a focus on genetic network structure and functionality—and antimicrobial resistance in the environment, covering policy aspects. Paula also has experience in industry as a CRM analyst and as Head of Studies at the Consumer Research Unit in a multinational telecommunications company.