RNA Seminar: Benjamin Nilsson-Payant

Dr Benjamin Nilsson-Payant – “Defective viral genomes of segmented (-)RNA viruses – friend or foe?”

RNA viruses carry highly conserved RNA-dependent RNA polymerases that they use to copy and transcribe their genomes. However, as RNA-dependent RNA polymerases are inherently error-prone, all RNA viruses produce aberrant replication products, so-called “defective viral genomes”.

Benjamin Nilsson-Payant’s research interests focus on understanding how influenza A virus and other respiratory and emerging negative-sense RNA viruses replicate their RNA genomes and how their (aberrant) replication products induce the innate immune response.

His lab at the TWINCORE - Centre for Experimental and Clinical Infection Research uses a combination approach of molecular biology tools, state-of-the-art transcriptomics and viral engineering to understand the molecular mechanisms of viral replication and how virus-host interactions affect viral replication and the innate immune response.