Welcome to the website of Iruka N. Okeke and her Molecular Microbiology lab. We are located in the Department of Pharmaceutical Microbiology, Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria’s premier hub of interdisciplinary science.
We are a bacteriology- and computational genomics-oriented lab that seeks to use molecular biology and genome sequencing to understand the evolution, epidemiology, population dynamics, pathogenesis, and dissemination of diarrheal pathogens, endemic bacterial pathogens and WHO-high priority pathogens, including (but not limited to) Acinetobacter, Klebsiella, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas, Salmonella, and Vibrio cholerae. We are particularly interested in the molecular basis of multi-drug resistance (MDR) and the reasons for the success of virulent clones in the hospital and the community.
We endeavor to adopt a one-health approach in the study of these pathogens, and collaborate with researchers within and outside the university community to achieve this objective. We also contribute to the nation’s fight against MDR by supporting the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control via the provision of next-generation sequencing and bioinformatics services in other to meet the objectives of the Global Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance System (GLASS).
We are also interested in drug discovery and development, including drug repurposing, for the purpose of finding potential anti-adhesive therapies.
We seek to build and maintain an environment that fosters inclusiveness and integrates advances in microbiology, molecular biology, genomics, and bioinformatics.