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Johan Neyts, Ph.D.

Full Professor of Virology, University of Leuven (KU Leuven)

Johan Neyts, Ph.D., is full professor of Virology at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven), Belgium, where he teaches virology at the medical school and at the school of dentistry. His laboratory has a long-standing expertise in the development of antivirals strategies and drugs against emerging and neglected viral infections such as Dengue and other flaviviruses, Chikungunya and other alphaviruses, enteroviruses, noroviruses, HDV, HEV, rabies and coronaviruses. A candidate pan-serotype Dengue inhibitor developed in his laboratory with the Centre for Drug Design and Discovery is currently in Phase 2 clinical studies. A second focus, together with Dr. Kai Dallmeier, is on the development of a Phase 1 vaccine platform. It aims to rapidly engineer highly thermostable vaccines against multiple viral pathogens. He also founded a KU Leuven spin-off, AstriVax.

Dr. Neyts is a past-president of the International Society for Antiviral Research. He is responsible for the Belgian VirusBank Platform, a 20 million € investment of the Belgian Federal Government in epidemic/pandemic preparedness. He has published more than 660 papers, received multiple national and international awards, and has given over 350 invited lectures and is frequently quoted in the scientific media.