Meyo Leonel is a member of the Cameroon Immunology Society, Research Assistant and laboratory manager of the Laboratory of Immunobiology and Helminth Infections (IBHI), he has the responsibility of setting up the laboratory, writing up SOPs, overseeing laboratory activities, assisting in the shipment and retrieval of samples, and performing pending experiments, biostatistical, and bioinformatical data analysis.
Leonel is also a Ph.D. student in infectiology at Ecole Doctorale Regionale D’Afrique Central En Infectiologie Tropicale in Gabon under the supervision of Dr. NONO KOMGUEP Justin. His research is centered on determining panels of potential biomarkers of schistosomiasis infection and/or liver pathology in schoolchildren from endemic areas of Cameroon with the ultimate goal of having biomarker-based diagnostic or monitoring strategies such as host plasma cytokine levels, gut microbes, and/or blood transcript profiling to complement current available tools and achieve the WHO 2030 target of eliminating schistosomiasis as a public health problem.
Leonel is a holder of a Master’s degree in microbiology-parasitology at the Faculty of Health Sciences of the Protestant University of Central Africa in Yaoundé, Cameroon, during which he was awarded a competitive UK-funded fellowship to conduct research within the IBHI-Lab. His Master thesis (2022), co-supervised by Dr. NONO KOMGUEP Justin and Dr. KAMDEM Donald Severin, focused on “Evaluation of the potential of GM-CSF and IL-4 plasma levels as biomarkers of hepatosplenic Schistosomiasis infection and pathology in school-aged children.”
Leonel has accumulated extensive data from his master’s and Ph.D. projects and is now focused on gaining expertise in metagenomics and transcriptomics. These skills will allow him to perform omics and multi-omics analyses, enhancing his ability to uncover novel insights into host-pathogen interactions and disease mechanisms.