Basil Britto Xavier, PhD

Basil Britto Xavier, Ph.D. in Medical Sciences from the University of Antwerp, Belgium. In addition, he holds a master's degree in Biology from the University of Iceland, Iceland, in Medical Bio-Ethics from KU Leuven, Belgium, Radboud University, The Netherlands, University of Padova, Italy, and Master of Philosophy in Microbiology: MPhil from Bharathidasan University. He holds a postgraduate Diploma in Bioinformatics and a Master's in Microbiology. His next-door research interests focus on antibiotic resistance and microbiome studies. He has over 16 years of experience in microbiology, molecular biology, and more specifically in next-generation sequencing workflows for a second (Illumina) and third-generation technologies (Oxford Nanopore and Pacbio) and the development of pipelines used in advanced genomic, metagenomic, transcriptomic research, and in DNA modifications, all related to clinical perspectives within microbiology. His background in molecular microbiology and bioinformatics has given rise to the conduct of unique translational studies that provide insight into the genetic dynamism of organisms and more specifically into multi-drug-resistant bacteria. The recently discovered plasmid-mediated resistance mechanism to colistin in Belgian livestock farming, (Xavier et al, Eurosurveillance, 2016, much-quoted article and novel van gene (vanP) cluster from Enterococcus faecium. In addition, he participated in the development and optimization of the latest next-generation sequencing technology protocols and developed analysis pipelines to use in advanced genetic, genomic, and metagenomic applications in combination with fundamental microbiology/molecular biological techniques with the objective of answering important questions in clinical microbiology/infectious diseases.