Helena Helmby PhD

Lecturer

Helena Helmby completed her PhD at Stockholm University in 1998. The subject of her thesis work was various aspects of immune regulation during malaria infection. She then moved to Manchester University where she studied T cell regulation and development of mucosal immunity during intestinal nematode infection. She joined the LSHTM in 2002 on a Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellowship and she was awarded a RCUK Fellowship in Helminth Immunology in 2006.

Affiliation

Teaching

Helena's main teaching activities are on the Immunology of Infectious Diseases MSc, but she also teaches on the Medical Parasitology MSc. She is also co-organizing the Parasite Immunology study unit.

Research

Helena's main research interest is to study the effects of chronic intestinal worm infection on the immune system. Intestinal dwelling nematodes are amongst the most common infections of man and approximately one in five of the world's population harbours at least one species and nearly all infections are in developing countries and mostly in children. An understanding of nematode-induced chronic immune activation is essential for the development of vaccines that can stimulate protective immunity while avoiding pathological consequences. The main focus of Helena's work is to increase the understanding on how chronic worm infections may alter immune responses to unrelated infections. She is particularly interested in the role intestinal worm infections may have on anti-malarial immunity. Understanding the impact of nematode infection in the pathology of malaria infection in humans would have important implications for treatment programs in large parts of the world.


Research areas

  • Helminths
  • Parasites

Disciplines

  • Immunology
  • Immunopathology
  • Medicine
  • Pathology

Disease and Health Conditions

  • Malaria

Other interests

  • Co-infection
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