Madeeha Afzal

Madeeha Afzal is a Post-doctoral Fellow at the Kirby Institute, University of New South Wales (UNSW), specializing in Immunovirology and Pathogenesis. She completed her PhD in Microbiology in 2023 from the School of Optometry and Vision Science at UNSW, with research focused on 'Determining the pathogenic traits of Staphylococcus aureus associated with keratitis' using molecular techniques and whole genome sequencing.

Her educational background includes:

• PhD Microbiology (2023), School of Optometry and Vision Science, UNSW
• M.Phil Microbiology (2010-2013), Hazara University Mansehra
• BS (Hons) Microbiology (2005-2009), Hazara University Mansehra

Madeeha has over 8 years of experience in Microbiology and Molecular Biology laboratory techniques and one year of teaching experience in Medical Microbiology. Her research focuses on:

• Staphylococcus aureus pathogenesis in ocular infections
• Antibiotic resistance mechanisms
• Genomics of bacterial pathogens
• Molecular epidemiology of ocular pathogens
• Computational materials science of various compounds

Her publication record demonstrates expertise spanning two distinct fields: microbiology/ophthalmology and materials science/physics. In microbiology, she investigates bacterial pathogenesis and antibiotic resistance, while in materials science, she conducts computational studies of physical properties using density functional theory.

Madeeha has presented her work at various platforms including the Annual Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO). She has received a scholarship for her PhD studies at UNSW and previously worked as a Research Officer and later Research Manager at a diagnostics and research center in Pakistan before moving to Australia.