Prof. Wanda Markotter is a virologist who began her academic career at the University of Pretoria (South Africa) in 2004. She is currently the Director of the Centre for Viral Zoonoses in the Department of Medical Virology at the university’s Faculty of Health Sciences. She has been involved in a transdisciplinary research program on disease ecology in bat species in South Africa and other African countries since 2005. Her research includes extensive fieldwork on bats and potential spillover hosts, virological testing, bat biology, ecological investigations, and human behavior studies. In January 2016, the DSI-NRF South African Research Chairs Initiative (SARChI) awarded her the Chair in Animal Infectious Diseases (Zoonoses).