Amit Kapoor, PhD

Dr. Kapoor identified the first non-primate homologs of Hepatitis C virus, including the well-known equine and rodent hepaciviruses. Absent immune-competent animal models for HCV, homolog hepaciviruses in their natural hosts could provide useful surrogate models to understand HCV pathogenesis and immunity. Currently, Dr Kapoor’s lab is characterizing the biological properties of these new HCV-like animal viruses using in vitro and reverse genetic systems paving the way for their detailed in vivo characterization. His main focus is to use these surrogate models to identify the determinants of HCV persistence and protective immunity.

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Amit Kapoor, PhD, is a interim associate director in the Center for Microbe and Immunity Research at the Abigail Wexner Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital and an associate professor of Pediatrics at The Ohio State University. Dr. Kapoor’s work focuses on molecular characterization of polio and enteroviruses associated with acute flaccid paralysis in North Indian children. This work was part of an effort to eradicate wild polioviruses from India using vaccination and surveillance. Dr. Kapoor joined Dr. Eric Delwart (UCSF) in 2002 as post doc and helped in the identification of several new human and animal viruses, including human cosavirus, bocaviruses, astroviruses, parvoviruses and picornaviruses. Dr. Kapoor joined Columbia University as Assistant professor in 2010, where he identified more new human and animal viruses including the first non- human primate homologs of Hepatitis C virus. His most recent work was the identification of human hepegivirus (also known as Human Pegivirus 2) in blood transfusion recipients and the development of VirCapSeq (a pan virome sequencing enrichment method, similar to the exon capture method).