Professor Kanta Subbarao

Professor Kanta Subbarao is the Director of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza and Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, The University of Melbourne at The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity.

She is a virologist and a physician with specialty training in paediatrics and paediatric infectious diseases. Prior to her arrival in Melbourne, she was a senior scientist at the US National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Over the years, Professor Subbarao’ s research has focused on newly emerging viral diseases of global importance including seasonal and pandemic influenza, SARS, MERS and now, SARS-CoV-2. Her current research efforts are directed at understanding the biology and immune responses to influenza viruses and vaccines and SARS-CoV-2.

She is an internationally recognised leader in the field of emerging respiratory viruses. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been invited to serve on several international panels on animal models and vaccines.