Centre Pasteur Cameroun : French Virologist At The Helm

The Centre Pasteur du Cameroun (CPC) is pleased to welcome Dr Mirdad Kazanji as its new Director General. The physician from France replaces his compatriot, Professor Elizabeth Carniel, who spent four years at the institution. The new Director General obtained a PhD in virology from the University of Paris XII, in 1993 and since October 1, 2021, have been the Director of Research at Centre Pasteur of Cameroon (CPC).
In 1999, Dr Mirdad Kazanji, joined the scientific executives of the Institut Pasteur to develop a vaccine against the HTLV-1 virus. For five years, he directed the retrovirology laboratory at the Institut Pasteur in Guyana, where several experimental vaccines were developed and tested in an animal model. From 2003 to 2004, he did a scientific stay at Ohio State University in the USA as a Visiting Professor and continues to work on HTLV-1 vaccines.
From 2005 to 2009, he headed the retrovirology unit of the International Centre for Medical Research in Franceville, Gabon, where the main activity was focused on host-retrovirus interactions in primates and the virological surveillance in Gabon.
Dr Kazanji has also directed the Institut Pasteur de Bangui (IPB) in the Central African Republic, CAR, from December 2009 to August 2014. The IPB has existed in CAR for over 50 years. It employs a hundred people. He is a member of the Institut Pasteur International Network. Given the geographical location of the IPB, the virologist oriented research towards emerging viruses and zoonoses, viral co-infection and retroviruses and the genetic variability and resistance. During these seven years, he strengthened the interactions between the different research teams of the Institut Pasteur de la Guyane as well as the different research organizations and bu...