Prof. Nikolai Windbichler Imperial College London, UK

Dr. Nikolai Windbichler is a Reader (Associate Professor) at Imperial College London and a Principal Investigator of the Transmission Zero research collaboration that aims to develop transmission-blocking gene drives for malaria mosquito population replacement. He has worked in the field of insect genome engineering for nearly two decades and combines... read morehis expertise in genetics with an engineering-driven mindset towards biological systems. He is a leading expert in the molecular genetics of the malaria mosquito and in the development of novel genetic control strategies for insect disease vectors and insect pests of agriculture. He has successfully led projects funded by the European Research Council, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Nikolai obtained his PhD in Genetics from the University of Vienna, Austria working on the biological engineering of functional RNAs in the group of Professor Renee Schroeder. He relocated to Imperial College London in 2006 to develop genetic control technologies for the malaria mosquito as a postdoctoral researcher in the group of Professor Andrea Crisanti working alongside Professor Austin Burt. Nikolai has taken the idea of using selfish genes for the control of disease vector populations from simply a theoretical concept to the first proof of principle demonstration that a class of such genes, driving endonucleases, could rapidly spread through caged mosquito or fly populations in a self-sustaining manner. This work was the successful demonstration of an engineered gene drive system - a finding that has kick-started the gene drive research field and led to the establishment of the Target Malaria consortium, which Nikolai remained a member of until 2014. Nikolai and colleagues later demonstrated the first suppressive CRISPR-Cas9-based gene drive system targeting caged populations of Anopheles gambiae. During this time Nikolai also pioneered the first successful steps towards the long-elusive goal of creating a synthetic meiotic sex-distortion system for genetic control. Such systems based on biased Y chromosome inheritance, originally theorized by W.D. Hamilton when also a lecturer at Imperial College, are attractive genetic methods for self-sustaining area-wide pest or vector control. Nikolai also generated the first sexually sterile strain of transgenic Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes, the first transgenic insect strain legally imported to Africa and the first genetically modified insect that was released into the environment in Africa by the Target Malaria consortium in Burkina Faso in 2019. Nikolai has also been involved in various initiatives to address the ethical and ecological questions that are raised by prospect of the application of transgenic insects and engineered gene drives in the environment.

In recent years Nikolai has worked to realize his long-held ambition to apply gene drive technology for the genetic control of devastating agricultural pest insects such as the Mediterranean fruit fly (medfly) and tap this technology’s significant commercial potential.