MIMS Spotlight Series: Meet Anna Överby Wernstedt

Text written by Nóra Lehotai and Anna Överby Wernstedt. Pictures: 1) Anna Överby Wernstedt, credit: Mattias Petterson, 2) Work in the Överby lab, credit: Mattias Petterson.

This is a MIMS Spotlight Series Extra article before the longer summer break. I chatted with Anna Överby Wernstedt, who is now a rather senior MIMS group leader. She was born and raised in Sweden and during her studies and career so far, she has lived in Scotland, Canada, the USA and Germany, to return to Sweden and join MIMS in 2011. Her life is full with activities, which she shares with her husband and their two children. 

Can you tell us about your role at MIMS, what are you working on now? 

I am a MIMS Group Leader,but as my 9 years-period is up, I am justfinishing the leftover funding for a postdoc in my group and will take up a new association within MIMS.My research field is virology, specialized in virus-host interactions. I am supervising a group of 9 people, and we are working with tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) virus and other mosquito- and tick-borne flaviviruses, and during the last year, it has been a lot of COVID and SARS research which means that a third of the lab switched to work on that topic and the rest of the group continued to do TBE research. 

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MIMS Spotlight Series: Meet Stefanie Willekens

Text written by Nóra Lehotai and Stefanie Willekens. Pictures owned by Stefanie Willekens. 

I had a chat with Stefanie, who joined the Överby lab in February 2021 as a postdoctoral fellow. However, she was no stranger to Umeå by that time. Stefanie has a Belgian nationality and has lived in the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden throughout her career. She shares her life with her dog, motorbike and an impressive stiletto collection.

Can you tell us about your role at MIMS, what are you working on now? 

I am working in Anna Överby’s group, mainly on flaviviruses, but I am the only one in Anna’s group who is not a virologist. I have a
background in imaging. I did my PhD in nucleo imaging, so I am someone who is more specialized in image processing. I am developing new imaging strategies for visualizing viral spread in neurotropic viruses in the brain. In short: brain mapping of virus infection, what type of viruses and what do they cause in the brain and how to visualize that with imaging techniques, this is my main topic.

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PATHOgenex RNA atlas - one of the best 50 articles in the area of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases

Text written by Nóra Lehotai

Illustration of the PATHOgenex, a freely available online RNA atlas of 32 human bacterial pathogens exposed to 11 infection relevant stress. Illutsration by Kemal Avican.

The recently published scientific article of MIMS researcher Kemal Avican and MIMS group leader Maria Fällman and their co-authors, is now among the Nature Communication's Editor Highlight articles as one of the best 50 publications in the area of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. It is a great achievement to conquer in such a short time as the article got published just in the beginning of June 2021. 
Both Maria and Kemal, the corresponding authors of the study, predicted that their work on stress responses in cross-microbial species, resulting in the PATHOgenex RNA atlas (www.pathogenex.org), could give a new, interactive tool into the hands of scientists to better understand adaptation strategies of different bacterial pathogens and give rise to the development of AI-powered approaches to solve complex research questions. Receiving this editorial highlight, also shows that this work is of particular interest and potential. 

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Anna Överby Wernstedt awarded the 2021 Eric K Fernströms Prize

Text written by Nóra Lehotai. Picture: Anna Överby Wernstedt (on the right) with one of her group members in the lab. Credit: Mattias Petterson.

Anna Överby Wernstedt, Associate Professor at the Department of Clinical Microbiology, Umeå University, and senior MIMS group leader, got awarded the prestigious Eric K Fernströms Prize for her research efforts on tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) virus and other mosquito- and tick-borne flaviviruses.

"This prize means a lot to me both at the personal and at the professional level. It is always nice to be recognized by others because they see potential in what you do, and this gives you a confirmation that you are on the right track”-says Anna.

The Eric K Fernströms Prize is awarded each year to young, exceptionally promising, and successful researchers working at the six Swedish universities’ medical faculties. The prizes are managed by the medical faculty at Lund University, and the prize money is donated by the Eric K Fernströms Stiftelse.

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Andrea Puhar elected as board member of Svenska Föreningen för Mikrobiologi

Text written by Nóra Lehotai. Picture: Andrea Puhar, MIMS group leader, Umeå University. Credit: Mattias Petterson.

MIMS group leader Andrea Puhar became a board member of Svenska Föreningen för Mikrobiologi.

The Svenska Föreningen för Mikrobiologi (SFM; Swedish Society for Microbiology) is an organization which collects and provides membership for individuals interested in microbiological sciences. SFM aims to support the progress and development of fundamental and applied microbiology both at the national and international level since the society is the Swedish node of FEMS (Federation of European Microbiological Societies). SFM organises scientific symposia, workshops and other networking activities, and they also collaborate with NDPIA to organize courses for young scientists.

Read more: Andrea Puhar elected as board member of Svenska Föreningen för Mikrobiologi