Georgina Ferry interviews William James, Professor of Virology, 18 August 2022.
Topics discussed include (00:00:22) early interest in medicine, particularly genetics, studies in Birmingham, PhD at Oxford and academic post at the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology [teaching bacteriology], work with James Porterfield on viruses, research in the 1980s on HIV; (00:03:07) macrophages, including how they interact with viruses; (00:08:00) macrophage differentiation pathway; (00:10:00) work in university administration, including as departmental bursar, Pro-Vice Chancellor; (00:16:47) first awareness of COVID-19, running of containment laboratories; (00:20:38) development of containment laboratories to work on live virus for SARS-CoV-2 at Oxford, work with Rebecca Moore, training of graduate students and postdocs; (00:22:13) infectivity reduction neutralisation assay, collaboration with Alain Townsend and Gavin Screaton's groups; (00:25:10) experience of collaboration during the early months of the pandemic, including hosting groups in containment facility, forum convened by Richard Cornall and remote meetings; (00:28:00) urgent questions, particularly relating to hospital diagnostics and sample handling, and the Phase II Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine clinical trial sample testing; (00:32:10) therapy and analysis, including monoclonal antibodies, ACE2 receptor; (00:36:09) SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and immunology, including interaction with ACE2 receptor; (00:41:10) work on ACE2 by colleagues in Zhuhai, China and work on nanobodies at the Rosalind Franklin Institute, Wellcome Trust collaborative programme and Disease X; (00:43:09) work on passive immunisation prior to epidemic outbreak; (00:44:35) work on aptamers; (00:50:00) use of stem cell technology in COVID; (00:57:29) level of knowledge of coronaviruses; (00:59:11) Dunn School team; (00:59:53) authors of scientific research papers, particularly collaborations; (01:02:31) ongoing lines of research started because of the pandemic; (01:07:46) undergraduate teaching, including remote teaching via Teams; (01:11:18) return to normal within the university; (01:13:15) personal impact of COVID-19, including ability to work in the laboratory; (01:14:30) threat from COVID-19, both inside the containment lab and in public, infection with COVID-19; (01:17:30) COVID safety regime within department; (01:18:50) sense of wellbeing generated through work on COVID-19; (01:19:50) involvement with national and international bodies; (01:21:10) changes in approach to work as a result of COVID-19; (01:23:05) funding for COVID-19 research. Note: the following sections of audio are redacted (00:21:08) to (00:21:14) and (00:44:50) to (00:47:09).
