Evan Barad
Master鈥檚 student Evan Barad began university pursuing an entirely different area of study: he was a history major before an undergraduate class in Health Sciences transformed his academic pathway.
During his fourth year of studies at FHS, Barad wanted to gain practical laboratory experience, so he applied for and secured two Undergraduate Studies Research Awards (USRAs) which saw him examining COVID-19 and people living with HIV under the supervision of FHS professor Zabrina Brumme. Barad went on to complete his Honours degree with Brumme and after graduating, became a research assistant in her lab.
Working again with Brumme as his supervisor, Barad鈥檚 research will involve studying low-level persistent viremia in a subset of people living with HIV who are taking antiretroviral therapies (ART). This condition 鈥 where the virus suddenly becomes detectable for no obvious reason 鈥 is frequently not resolvable through medication changes and can persist for years, causing great anxiety and stress. Prior studies have found that this viremia originates from clonal copies of the HIV virus that reside inside an individual鈥檚 reservoir cells, and might not even be infectious in some cases due to mutations in the virus鈥 genome. However, prior studies of this phenomenon have utilized small sample sizes and many questions about this occurrence remain unknown.
Barad鈥檚 investigation will involve using cutting-edge laboratory approaches to characterize, in-depth, a cohort of individuals experiencing low-level HIV virema during ART. Using a combination of archived and collected blood samples, Barad will characterize the diversity and infectiousness of the virus during these episodes and aims to identify the reservoir cells responsible for producing the viremia. His results will help advance understanding of HIV reservoir biology and also contribute to improving HIV clinical care for the subset of people experiencing this form of viremia.
When he鈥檚 not engaged in research or study, Barad enjoys being physically active and socializing. You can usually find him bouldering or challenging one of the many escape rooms in Vancouver alongside friends. (They鈥檝e completed 30 rooms so far!)