People

Alex Sigal leads the lab at the Hebrew University's Lautenberg Center in Jerusalem and the Africa Health Research Institute in Durban. The Durban lab was the first to isolate and test the SARS-CoV-2 Beta variant and isolate and characterize escape of the Omicron variant. The group has since followed how the virus evolves during prolonged infection in people with advanced HIV disease and created a new program on infection and aging.

Khadija Khan is co-PI of the lab and works in Durban. She studies the effect of viral infection on aging. She has led work on neutralization escape by Omicron BA.1 (Nature 2022), BA.4/BA.5 (Nat Commun 2022) and BA.2.86 (Nat Commun 2023), and on how antibody immunity builds up after infection and vaccination, including in people living with HIV.

Victoria Sviridchik is the lab manager in Jerusalem. She studies how mpox virus modulates the innate immune response, and the dynamics and memory of that response. She has also contributed to the SARS-CoV-2 BA.3.2 subvariant paper, the cerebrospinal fluid proteomics study, and the chikungunya transcriptional response work.

Yashica Ganga is a co-lab supervisor in Durban. She studies the neutralizing antibody response to mpox and how it depends on HIV status and viral suppression. Over several years she has contributed to work on SARS-CoV-2 antibody responses in people with and without HIV (HIV status and Beta variant infection), HIV spread between cells, Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection of macrophages, the SARS-CoV-2 BA.3.2 subvariant paper, and the chikungunya transcriptional response work.

Zesuliwe Jule is a co-lab supervisor in Durban. She studies immunity to respiratory infections in the South African population. She is first author of the SARS-CoV-2 BA.3.2 subvariant paper, and has contributed to work on persistent SARS-CoV-2 infection in advanced HIV disease, the host-protein antibody study, and the cerebrospinal fluid proteomics study.

Kajal Reedoy is a technologist working on viral evolution and drug response. She has contributed to studies of how Omicron (BA.2.86) and BA.3.2 (Virus Evolution 2026) evolved and escape neutralization, to the host-protein antibody study, and to the chikungunya transcriptional response work.

Adan Irshead is the lab administrator in Jerusalem and keeps the lab running day to day.

Avia Zohar, M.Sc. student, studies what determines how well a drug inhibits viral infection.

Daniel Riazanov, advanced intern, works in computational biology and image analysis.

Miri Landau, M.Sc. student, studies how the host innate immune response is modulated.

Siphokazi Silangwe, M.Sc. student, studies Dengue prevalence in the South African population. She is also a co-author on the SARS-CoV-2 BA.3.2 subvariant paper.

Taskeen Hossen, M.Sc. student, studies how different viruses respond to broadly acting antivirals. She is also a co-author on the SARS-CoV-2 BA.3.2 subvariant paper.