Keith Chappell

Keith is Molecular Virologist and group leader with a dual appointment within the Australian Bioengineering and Nanotechnology Institute and the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences. His research is focused on vaccine development and the understanding of medically and environmentally significant viruses. Keith is one of the inventors of a UQ’s molecular clamp platform and is the co-leader of a program to produce a vaccine for COVID-19 at UQ. Keith has played a leading role in designing and implementing an epidemic response vaccine pipeline which enabled the progression of UQ’s COVID-19 vaccine candidate from sequence information to clinical trial dosing within 6 months.

Keith completed his PhD at the University of Queensland in 2007 on the structure and function of flavivirus NS3 protease. Subsequently, he spent three years (2007-2010) as a post-doctoral researcher at one of Spain’s most respected research institutes, Instituto Salud Carlos III, where I conducted research on the fusion protein of Respiratory Syncytial viurs as a target for conformationally specific neutralizing antibodies. Keith returned to UQ in 2011 and his research has focused on understanding of many medically and environmentally important viruses and bacteria, particularly focussing on Influenza, Respiratory Syncytial virus (RSV), SARS-CoV-2, Koala Retrovirus and Streptococcus pneumoniae.