Sebastian Lequime

I am fascinated by the central role viruses have played in the evolution of life on Earth and, paradoxically, how little we know about them. Recent high-throughput sequencing studies have only started to uncover their genetic diversity, but little is known about the ecology, evolutionary history, and interactions between this vast array of viruses and their hosts. My research aims to explore these aspects and participate in the effort to understand viruses better, hopefully allowing us to comprehend and manage their impact on us, our domesticated animals and plants, our ecosystems, and even our whole biosphere.

For this, I build upon my academic background that allies the general knowledge of biology and medicine taught in pharmacy (Tours, FR) with advanced research-oriented biology classes offered by the École Normale Supérieure (ENS, Paris, FR). I have explored virology, with a particular focus on evolutionary virology, during my Master degree (Paris, FR), Ph.D. (Institut Pasteur, Paris, FR) and Postdoc (KU Leuven, Belgium). Since 2020, I lead my independent group at the University of Groningen. My work has brought me into various fields, such as theoretical biology and modeling, population genetics, genomics, marine biology, and entomology.

In addition to my scientific interest, I am deeply convinced of the benefits of the FAIR principles of Open Data and Science, and I try to serve my scientific community by advocating for them.

My research aims to harness genomics and the characterization of evolutionary processes to better understand the ecology of RNA viruses across scales, from within- to between hosts, from small transmission chains to epidemics, and from deep to recent evolutionary processes.

To explore these questions, I use an integrated combination of “wet” (controlled experiments, fieldwork, high-throughput sequencing) and “dry” (bioinformatics, phylodynamics, modeling, and simulations) approaches.

Overview on Ocasys

Course coordinator:

• Evolutionary Medicine: Infectious diseases (Master)

Lecturer:

• Genomics in Ecology and Evolution (Master)
• Practical Bioinformatics for Biologists (Master)
• Evolutionary Medicine (Bachelor)
• Genetics and Evolution (Bachelor)
• Evolutionary and Ecological Genomics (Bachelor)

Supervisions (Individual Education):

Bachelor and Master research projects, essays, and colloquia

Recommender - PeerCommunityIn (PCI) Infections
Member of the Scientific council of the French-Dutch network (nlfr.eu)
Data Editor - Journal of Evolutionary Biology (ESEB society journal)