Dr Samantha Dando

Biography

Dr Samantha Dando leads the Neuroimmunology and Infections Research Group at QUT. The research group aims to understand the highly specialised immunological niches within the brain and eye, and determine how infection and immunity within these niches contributes to neurological and ocular diseases. Furthermore, the team aims to understand how pathogens invade the CNS and persist as latent (chronic) infections.

Samantha completed her PhD in microbiology at QUT in 2012. Her PhD investigated intra-amniotic infections caused by the bacterial opportunistic pathogen, Ureaplasma parvum. In 2012, she took up a postdoctoral position at Griffith University where she studied the immunopathogenesis of Burkholderia pseudomallei and the mechanisms by which this bacterium can penetrate the central nervous system. In 2014, she relocated to Monash University, where her research focus shifted to neuroimmunology and ocular immunology. In 2018, she received an Australian Research Council DECRA Fellowship to undertake discovery research to characterise novel subsets of resident immune cells within sub-compartments of the brain and eye. Dr Dando returned to QUT in October 2018 as a Lecturer in Clinical Microbiology within the School of Biomedical Sciences and Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, where she established the Neuroimmunology and Infections Research Group.