Dr Gwen Knight
BA MSc MRes PhD
Associate Professor
I am currently working on a project exploring the interaction between demography and antibiotic resistance prevalence in infection, funded by an MRC Career Development Award. I am also co-Director of the AMR Centre.
I returned to LSHTM in November 2017 with an MRC Skills Development Fellowship to explore the dynamics of antimicrobial resistance using mathematical modelling. Prior to this (2015-2017), I worked at the NIHR funded Health Protection Research Unit on Healthcare Associated Infections and Antimicrobial Resistance at Imperial College London. I am now involved in the CMMID COVID-19 response.
My previous role at LSHTM (2012-2015), was as a research fellow, in the TB modelling team, where I was involved in modelling the dynamics of the disease Tuberculosis (TB) and the impact of a range of different control measures from new drug regimens to vaccines.
I completed my PhD in 2012 investigating various aspects, both modelling and experimental, of the hospital associated bacteria methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). This was completed at CoMPLEX, UCL, with experimental and epidemiological work based at St George's Healthcare NHS Trust. Prior to this, I was awarded a BA in Mathematics from Oxford University, and an MSc in Mathematical Modelling from UCL. This led to an MRes in Modelling Biological Complexity at CoMPLEX.
More information can be found on my personal web page.
Affiliations
Centres
Teaching
I co-organise the AMR Centre Short Course:"Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR): a Multidisciplinary Approach".
Research
My research falls broadly into three areas: understanding the dynamics of bacteriophage driven resistance evolution in S. aureus, modelling One Health interventions and data exploration within SEFASI (the JPIAMR project I PI) and my fellowship, which aims to explore the interaction between age, gender and the dynamics of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). I am also interested in developing better methods to support data-guided empiric antibiotic guidelines.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, I was involved in work to estimate the burden of hospital-acquired infection and settings of transmission, as well as the interaction of COVID-19 with AMR drivers.
At the HPRU in HCAI and AMR at Imperial College London I worked on projects using locally collected data to design better interventions for control of carbapenem resistant Enterobacteriaceae alongside thinking about the fundamental question of where does AMR originate from?
I have a long standing interest in Mycobacterium tuberculosis, specifically the resistant subpopulation (multidrug resistant, MDR-TB). I have been involved in investigating new methods to control the spread (e.g. antiretroviral therapy, potential new TB vaccines) as well as the impact of shortening therapy.
Selected Publications
