Scott Tibbetts,

Fun Fact: I love traveling, travel photography, and learning about other cultures through experiences, conversations, and food; being able to be a part of a multi-cultural team is one of my favorite aspects of academic science. Our lab studies gammaherpesviruses – viruses such as Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and Kaposi’s sarcoma herpesvirus (KSHV, HHV-8), which are associated with multiple types of human malignancies, including lymphomas, carcinomas, and sarcoma. Our research harnesses the power of the closely related murine gammaherpesvirus (MHV68) in vivo system to gain insight into the mechanisms by which viral noncoding RNAs contribute to latency and tumorigenesis, and to define the molecular and pathogenic strategies that these viruses use to evade the immune system and manipulate B cell biology in order to establish lifelong latent infections. The long-term goals of these studies are to better understand the complex interplay between these viruses and the host immune response, and define how alterations in this relationship can result in the development of lymphoproliferative diseases and lymphoma, and elucidate new targets for prevention of gammaherpesvirus malignancies.

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