Wyres lab

Kelly is a computational microbiologist with a background in bacterial population genetics and genomics. She is Associate Professor and Research Group Leader at the Department of Infectious Diseases, Monash University, and Deputy Director for the Monash University Centre to Impact AMR. She co-Leads the Department of Infectious Diseases Genomics program and is also co-Lead for the KlebNET Genomic Surveillance Platform, a multi-national consortium working to develop and harmonise resources that support global genomic surveillance for Klebsiella and Escherichia coli. Kelly has received numerous research funding awards, including a National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Investigator Grant, Australian Research Council Discovery Project awards and Gates Foundation Investment Grants. In 2024 Kelly was named a Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher and in 2025 received the Australian Society for Microbiology’s Frank Fenner Award. Read about Kelly’s research journey here.

Tom is a postdoctoral researcher working on K. pneumoniae sero-epidemiology and the ongoing development of our tools for typing capsule and lipopolysaccharide loci from bacterial genome data- Kaptive and Kaptive Web. This includes improving Kaptive’s accuracy for prediction of K. pneumoniae capsule phenotypes. Tom holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh, UK.

Hina is a data management specialist leading a community effort to collate and curate a standardised meta-data collection for publicly available Klebsiella genome sequences. Hina holds a Master’s in Public Health and International Health from The University of New South Wales.

Naosie is a postdoctoral researcher developing and applying novel Kaptive databases for Klebsiella oxytoca O antigen loci and E. coli capsule loci, to explore the sero-epidemiology of these important pathogens. Naoise holds a PhD in Clinical Microbiology from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland.

Kalani is a third year PhD student using metabolic modelling to investigate the association between K. pneumoniae species complex metabolic traits and ecological niche. Kalani previously completed a Masters of Data Science and a Bachelor of Science (Hons) at Monash University, focussing on Shigella sonnei genomics.

Hassan is a PhD student working to identify K. pneumoniae genomic and metabolic factors associated with isolates that cause urinary tract infections in hospitalised patients. Hassan is co-supervised and based with Prof Kathryn Holt, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK.

Jiahui is a PhD student investigating the composition of K. pneumoniae surface membranes and the impact of porin mutations. Jiahui is co-supervised and based with Prof Trevor Lithgow, Monash University, Australia.

Abhinaba is a PhD student investigating the prevalence and diversity of bacteriocins within the K. pneumoniae population. Bacteriocins are antimicrobial peptides produced by the bacteria to kill competing cells. Abhinaba is co-supervised by Dr Ben Vezina and Prof Sheena McGowan (Monash University).