University of Glasgow

The MRC-University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research (CVR) is the leading research institute in the UK focused entirely on viruses affecting human health and those at the human-animal interface. The CVR will contributed to two of the key objective of UK-CIC.

Within Theme 2, which aims to characterise protective immunity against SARS-CoV-2, the CVR will be coordinating patient recruitment, isolation of blood cells and distribution of samples to other UK-CIC sites. In addition, the CVR will perform careful quantification of the viral load in the recruited patients and investigate their past exposure to a variety of respiratory pathogens.

Within Theme 5, which instead focuses on determining how SARS-CoV-2 evades the immune system, the CVR will investigate a specific class of genes (called interferon stimulated genes, ISGs) and their potential to block viral replication. Once ISGs with antiviral properties will be identified, the CVR will investigate how they vary within the human population and determine whether this variation is associated with an increased or reduced antiviral activity.