Neafsey Lab
The Neafsey Lab uses genomic, transcriptomic, and serologic data to make significant scientific discoveries in malaria and other vector-borne diseases. By studying the genetics of microbes, their carriers (like mosquitoes), and their human hosts, the lab develops new molecular and bioinformatic tools that support public health efforts. Their research helps improve treatments and deepens our understanding of how these diseases spread and evolve.
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
665 Huntington Avenue
Building 1, Room 103
Boston, Massachusetts 02115
People
Daniel Neafsey
Daniel Neafsey’s laboratory studies the evolutionary genomics of malaria parasites and mosquito vectors. Prior to becoming a faculty member at Harvard, he led a research group at the Broad Institute, where he retains a role as associate director of the Broad Institute’s Genomic Center for Infectious Disease. He is excited by the potential for new technology and data to turn the tide against diseases like malaria.
Neafsey’s current projects involve the application of comparative genomic and population genetic analyses to Plasmodium malaria parasites and Anopheles mosquitoes to study population structure, natural selection, and genomic factors underlying parasite and vector phenotypes that impact public health. Neafsey’s interests also include the use of pathogen polymorphism data to inform vaccine design and understand vaccine efficacy, analysis of drug resistance mechanisms and evolution, and the use of clinical genotyping data to interpret disease transmission dynamics. The lab works on developing new molecular protocols and informatic tools to address key questions in infectious disease and global health.
Researchers
Program Manager for the Antibody Observatory hosted within the department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases.
Raphael develops computational genomic pipelines to enable scalable analyses of parasite and vector population genomics datasets for epidemiological and public health applications. Previously, Raphael developed software to analyze large databases within the clinical informatics and public health domains.
Angela uses computational genetic approaches to understand how fitness tradeoffs and disease interventions shape the short-term evolutionary dynamics of Plasmodium and mosquitoes.
Katrina is the lab manager for the Neafsey Lab. One of her many responsibilities is to process thousands of malaria parasite and mosquito samples for DNA sequencing.
Annie Laws is the project manager for a Gates-funded project to develop molecular surveillance systems for malaria parasites and mosquitoes in Guyana and Colombia.
Philipp is interested in novel methods of genomic data generation and interpretation to understand P. falciparum and P. vivax biology and biogeography. He completed his PhD in 2020 with Dr. Martin Llewellyn at the University of Glasgow, studying the evolutionary genomics of Trypanosoma cruzi and Leishmania infantum parasites in South America.
Jacob is a research scientist in the Duraisingh and Neafsey labs. His background is in computational evolutionary genetics across numerous species including snails, strawberries, frogs, and humans. At HSPH he has joined the malaria research community, examining genomics of human hosts, parasites, and mosquito vectors.
Postdoctoral Fellows
Students
Paulo’s thesis work is focused on optimizing a multiplexed amplicon sequencing protocol for Plasmodium vivax and applying it to thousands of samples from South America to understand local malaria transmission and epidemiology.
Sarah is a PhD student interested in combining tools from genomics and immunology to examine host-parasite coevolution. Sarah previously worked on projects in SARS-CoV-2 genomics and mammalian immune system evolution.
Department Associate
James Shea received the Iowa Poetry Prize for Last Day of My Face, forthcoming from the University of Iowa Press. An associate professor and director of the creative writing program at Hong Kong Baptist University, he is currently on sabbatical leave as the poet-in-residence in the Neafsey Lab.
For a full listing of James’s publications please visit his Catalyst page