First Secondments and Fieldwork Started

We are therefore happy to announce that the first secondment has already started. Sarah, DC 10, has just moved to the Netherlands from Toulouse, France. Sarah is currently working on a between-farm HPAI transmission model and the influence of vaccination on that. To gain deeper insights into transmission models, Sarah is spending three months at Wageningen Bioveterinary Research (WBVR), under the supervision of Dr. Jose Gonzales. She will work together with the WBVR team and get familiar with their models and techniques, to that she can improve her own model. Wish good luck to Sarah, and stay tuned on our website and LinkedIn page for more information on the secondments!

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The year has just started, and so did the fieldwork for our project! Oumaima Kadiri, DC7 working on environmental sampling and transmission modelling in Morocco, is sharing some of her experience on the ground: “During my fieldwork, I’m working on avian influenza surveillance in poultry farms. The goal is to better understand how the virus circulates in real farming conditions and to improve early detection. On site, I collect samples from poultry (cloacal and oropharyngeal swabs) as well as environmental samples from different areas of the farm (walls, feeders, drinkers). This fieldwork is a key part of my research, as it connects scientific methods with real-world conditions and helps develop more effective and realistic surveillance strategies to protect animal and public health.” 

Wish good luck to Oumaima in her work, and stay tuned to see what other DCs are up to!