Dr Kirill Sharshov, PhD, is the Head of Molecular Epidemiology and Biodiversity of Viruses, Federal Research Center of Fundamental and Translational Medicine, Novosibirsk, Russia. The research focuses primarily on the molecular virology and molecular epidemiology of viruses, including avian influenza viruses, ecology of influenza viruses and their hosts, mechanisms for interspecies transmission, studying of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) viruses and their pathogenicity using animal models, antigenic variability of influenza virus, and influenza virus evolution. Also of interest are the molecular epidemiology and virology of coronaviruses and paramyxoviruses (including Newcastle Disease Virus) circulating in animals and humans. His research focuses have received recent renewed interest, especially in the frame of the global virome/microbiome concept.