Thanks for visiting! I am Ian M. Mackay, no longer a working Scientist but for now still an adjunct Associate Professor (University of Queensland). I have a PhD in virology from UQ. This blog is not affiliated with any Organisation and contains cited facts and some personal opinions. This About Me page is designed to give you way too much background to Virology Down Under’s (VDU) Blogger-In-Chief.

Still reading? Okay then.

From 1992 to 2015, I discovered, characterised, detected, manipulated, grew, visualised, and generally worked with viruses as a scientist at the Queensland Paediatric Infectious Diseases (Qpid) laboratory (formerly the Clinical Virology Research Unit [CVRU]) housed at the Sir Albert Sakzewski Virus Research Centre (SASVRC), as an employee of Queensland Health.

At one point, Qpid was affiliated with the Queensland Children’s Medical Research Institute, but the QCMRI didn’t survive. Neither did SASVRC in its full sense, but it saw a lot of research and researchers during its time.

From Uni to research to meaning

I was initially a research assistant, and I completed an MSc(Qual) and then a PhD in virology. The PhD discussed the development and application of molecular diagnostics, which permitted the discovery and characterisation of human metapneumovirus (hMPV) in Australia. It also included some Lentivector-mediated gene therapy (not in humans).

The initial Lentivector project fell apart, as these things sometimes do, which required teeing up a new supervisor. I made the best of a bad situation, and I was lucky. I’ve been lucky my whole life; lucky to be white, to be born where I was, to live where I have, lucky to have such a smart and awesome partner (also a virologist, co-author and co-thinker on the successful grants and now a successful grant-getter in an entirely different field), lucky to have a house, a car, a job, my health and lucky to have fantastic children.

I sought and received some research projects and grants (my first came right after my PhD was conveyed, and they didn’t stop until about 2012.

Over that time, my small lab team – working with Qpid under the leadership of Prof Theo Sloots – and I were often the 2nd to discover a few viruses that had just been reported in the literature somewhere else, finding hMPV first, then HCoV-NL63, HBoV and HCoV-HKU1 in Australia. One of the papers was received and accepted within a week! Heady times. One of my PhD students characterised a virus, HRV-QPM, representing a weird clade of rhinoviruses we’d seen since 2003, into the third rhinovirus species, HRV-C. That was really goosebumps stuff.

I’ve worked with aerosolised viruses, detected polyomaviruses, isolated respiratory viruses, screened thousands of samples for viruses, written or co-written over 80 papers on viruses and managed a bunch of students while working on viruses.

I’ve worked with and around some fantastic scientists who have taught me much. Also, some other people I’ve …shared lab space with… and learned other things from.😒

Then, I didn’t get grants.

I left research in 2015 for a range of reasons, including wanting to actually use my science for good and to see something more real for my efforts, not enjoying my laboratory working environment….and that whole not getting funding to work independently thing.

My post-research life started in 2015 at Public Health Virology, Queensland Health, Brisbane, where I ran the Development and Validation Team (me plus a legend in PQ Microbiology, Judy). Basically, I designed, optimised and validated molecular tests for new and existing viruses of public health significance. I had a few other things happening as well and sometimes they ended up as papers, other writings or just the knowledge that I helped something useful get done. In December 2020, I left there to help co-found, set up and manage a new Pathology Queensland laboratory (still with Queensland Health) at the end of 2020 to expand capacity for SARS-CoV-2 molecular (PCR) testing. Those were the most hectic and stressful but fun times, and that team was the absolute best. The learning curve there was phenomenal. I left the role in November 2024 and am currently on a break of indeterminate length. It’s been a long decade.

None of this would be possible – or worthwhile – without my brilliant partner in life, Kat

And it has all occurred in Brisbane, South-East Queensland, Australia, despite being born in New Zealand and living there my first 16 years.

The blog tech

VDU was created initially on a 486DX2/66 at home – then on a Gateway Pentium II (128Mb RAM and 6.4Gb HDD) on its 17″ monitor, then my Dell Pentium III 1000MHz (128Mb RAM, 10Gb HDD) notebook, an Acer Pentium 4 3GHz (1Gb RAM, 120Gb HDD), then a Dell XPS8300 (16Gb RAM, corei7-2600 [email protected]) or XPSL321X ultrabook (4Gb RAM, core i7-2637M [email protected]) and now on a Dell Corei7-7820 3.6GHz Alienware Area-51 R4 with 32GB RAM. The blog was only a few pages, to begin with, but grew in an ad hoc fashion. I liked changing my mind about what style looked good, but it’s been settled for quite a few years now.

The site was designed using Coffee Cup, with a little stint using Dreamweaver, and some HTML and CSS experiences were thrown in there as well. VDU was hosted on the University of Queensland student servers back in the day and then supported on the staff servers by SASVRC, but eventually, I closed the website down.

A new hobby at 40-something

Then, I started a blog (the two overlapped for a time) in March 2013. The first blog over on Blogspot and the use of social media began on an Easter school holiday at Kat’s suggestion.

It started with little clippings of things, focussing mostly on influenza H7N9 and MERS-CoV. Before all this, I was very anti-anything-to-do-with-social-media. Then I used Twitter a lot, alongside this newer blog, to try and break down science for a bigger public audience, grump a bit, highlight lies and write about topical virus-related things. I dumped that and my 100,000+ followers (accidentally, it turns out), but maintain a mostly lurking presence there and on Mastodon and Threads but I’ve settled on Bluesky in 2024 because the engagement is better and, finally, those I most enjoyed following on Twitter, have mostly moved across.

I’m also trying to use what I learned to be a better example of an old white male (OWM) human being. I’m late to that. But I’m trying.

What I am not

I’m not a teacher, although all researchers teach to some extent.

I’m not a graphic designer, although I like to play and currently use Inkscape for the graphics and Excel for the graphs. I do love a good graph.

I’m no computer expert, faaaarrrrrr from it, but I am my household’s network manager.

I’m certainly not a literary scholar or writer, hence the frequent typos (I also blame my multifocals) and simplistic language. But I’ve found that I enjoy writing – especially when it isn’t a grant application.

I have absolutely no formal education in communication (Comms), risk management, sociology or epidemiology. I am not and will likely never be a full Professor, nor am I one of the nation’s leading researchers or one of Australia’s leading virologists. Possibly just Australia’s mouthiest virologist.

I’d like to be good at this

All that said, I still have a desire to try and get across a simpler version of the often dense, usually dry, sometimes deliberately confusing information that various people have for years tried to place in my head or that I have picked up in the course of my research and scientific life.

During my working life, science outreach and communication have become a thing. Although the pandemic (the COVID-19 one as I update this page, maybe an avian influenza one when I next update it!) has dampened some of that for many scientists who wore and still wear too much aggression. It’s a long way from being part of the considered workload for many scientists, but it should be, and we need to do better to convey the need for it among our scientist peers.

There is no external funding of VDU, no payment for the personal time used to write, research or maintain the site, communicate on Bluesky, speak to the media, nor anything but personal funds used to host the site, buy and maintain the computers, screens, storage, books, software subscriptions, home office maintenance or the electricity used. I consider this my contribution to amateur science communication and the world. Imperfect though that contribution may be. Imposter syndrome is strong in this house. That will be a work in progress until I’m dust.

Most of the information I publish has references to a source. And it is all written so that I can understand it. It’s also all written by me without using AI to this point in time (05.12.2024). So really. this is not a selfless act.

I don’t intend this site to be a one-stop-shop for homework or assignments, but I do hope it can convey some of my knowledge about some viruses and virus-related events in a way that (a) stands the test of at least some time, (b) is in a form that at least some of you can learn from and (c), doesn’t have too many lists. I also hope that I absolutely never speak in absolutes because biology doesn’t roll that way.😉 Failing that, I know I learn new things each time I research each and every blog post on VDU. That point, along with having a resource of information in the form of posts that I can point others to and the feedback I get from those who learn something and enjoy the content, is still enough for me.