“SARS-CoV-2 co-infections, COVID-19 co-infections database” – new research project at the University of Gdańsk

Gdansk has a strong vaccine development arm through the Intercollegiate Faculty of Biotechnology and the International Centre for Cancer Vaccine Science, which have recently adapted their focus to support COVID-19 research in the context of vaccines and immunotherapies.

To support these efforts, Doctor Łukasz Rąbalski from the Department of Recombinant Vaccines of the Intercollegiate Faculty of Biotechnology of the University of Gdańsk alongside Doctor Javier Alfaro from the International Centre for Cancer Vaccine science have been  awarded a grant from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education to establish a programme for the study of co-infection in  COVID-19 patients.

Not much is known about COVID-19 and its interactions with other commonly occuring diseases. Łukasz and Javier have joined forces to develop a strong knowledge base of these cases in Poland. Patient trajectories will be carefully monitored and state-of-the-art artificial intelligence methods will be used to identify clusters of patients with co-infections with altered prognosis. The Biotechnologies developed by Doctor Łukasz Rąbalski will be combined with Bioinformatics discoveries to enable more personalized therapies and the next round of therapeutics in our fight against the disease.

The funding has been awarded directly from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education for his project “SARS-CoV-2 co-infections, COVID-19 co-infections database”  in the amount of PLN 985,000.

According to the Ministry, which assessed the project, such the bioinformatics resources developed through the project will be a valuable source of information on the occurrence of mixed infections and their impact on patients’ health, both for services responsible for epidemiological safety and for medical services. In addition, the collected data will be able to support doctors in decision-making processes.

 

Doctor Łukasz Rąbalski                                                                                                                                         Doctor Javier Alfaro