Tessa Campbell

Tessa Campbell

Postdoctoral Researcher
Visiting address: NEO Medicinaren 25, HERM plan 7, Hälsovägen 7C (lastkaj), 14157 Huddinge/Stockholm
Postal address: H7 Medicin, Huddinge, H7 HERM Bryceson, 171 77 Stockholm
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About me

  • Tessa is an SSMF Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Bryceson group investigating NK cell homeostasis and plasmacytoid dendritic cell function using cases of primary immunodeficiency.

Research

  • Tessa's interest in natural killer (NK) cells started during a bachelor's research internship at Karolinska Institutet. Upon returning to her home country of Australia she undertook her PhD in herpesvirology at the University of Sydney, initiating the first studies into varicella zoster virus evasion of NK cell activity. Intrigued by the life-threatening infections from herpesviruses suffered by NK cell deficient patients, she returned to Karolinska Institutet to pursue this line of research in the Bryceson group. In response to the demand of the COVID-19 pandemic, Tessa expanded her research profile to the antiviral type I IFN properties of plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs). Tessa is currently supported by an SSMF Postdoctoral Fellowship to improve diagnostics of primary immunodeficiencies and advance our understanding of human NK cell and pDC homeostasis to harness their potential in health and disease.

Teaching

  • During her postdoc and PhD, Tessa has been involved as a course lecturer, tutorial leader, and laboratory mentor at Karolinska Institutet and the University of Sydney. Her teaching profile covers bachelor, master's, doctoral, and medical program courses on immunology, virology, and human biology.

    Science communication
    Tessa is an active science communicator in person and online on Twitter/X (@ScientistTess). In 2022 she was recognised as the Top Influencer at the meeting of The European Society for Immunodeficiencies (ESID2022) and was awarded free registration for the next society meeting. Tessa has also previously won the People's Choice Award (2018) for her Day of Immunology public engagement, presenting ‘NK cells: Ninjas of the immune system’. Since 2019 she has been involved in the Skype A Scientist program, skyping classrooms around the world to discuss science, as well as invitations to speak in person at several high school career and science events.

Articles

All other publications

Grants

  • Decoding severe respiratory virus susceptibility in aging
    Loo and Hans Osterman Foundation for Medical Research
    30 June 2024 - 30 June 2025
  • Karolinska Institutet
    9 November 2023
  • Deciphering viral infection susceptibility in people living with obesity
    Clas Groschinsky's Memorial Foundation
    21 September 2023 - 21 September 2024
  • Swedish Research Council
    1 January 2023 - 31 December 2026
    Pediatric hyperinflammatory syndromes represent a heterogenous group of life-threatening disorders associated with impaired immunity and excessive inflammation. A majority of patients lack a molecular diagnosis and treatments of these conditions are not standardized. There is a critical need for personalized medicine. Building on advanced clinical pipelines and unique patient samples, the specific aims of our proposal are to (1) establish systematic, longitudinal sampling and analyses of pediatric patients with suspected primary immunodeficiency disease (PID), (2) establish systems to evaluate protein-coding variants of unknown significance in genes associated with the most severe PID, (3) identify new PIDs through cutting-edge functional genomic analyses, and (4) determine and understand the pathophysiological mechanisms of novel hyperinflammatory disorders with poor clinical outcome. Our innovative approach combines unique patient material with advanced bioinformatic algorithms and cellular methodology. This proposal is supported by the pioneering translational immunological expertise of the lead investigator and will benefit from a worldwide network of collaborators. Ultimately, we will identify novel molecular causes of hyperinflammatory syndromes which can facilitate personalized medicine. It will also provide proof-of-concept methodology that can be employed in the diagnostics of other unexplained patients with suspected monogenic disease.
  • The Swedish Society for Medical Research
    1 January 2022 - 1 January 2025

Employments

  • Postdoctoral Researcher, Department of Medicine, Huddinge, Karolinska Institutet, 2021-2025

Degrees and Education

  • PhD, Medicine, On interactions between alphaherpesviruses and natural killer cells, University of Sydney, 2019
  • Bachelor of Science (Honours class I), Immunobiology and microbiology, Regulation of natural killer cell ligands and activity by varicella zoster virus & herpes simplex virus type 1, University of Sydney, 2013

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