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Pereboom Alumni Association Professor of Excellence Ogden Honors College

2021

Professorship awarded to one faculty annually at LSU for excellence in innovation and scholarship

2021 Worley Professor of Excellence

2018

Excellent in research award for School of Veterinary Medicine

Zoetis Research Award

Seroprevalence of Dengue, Zika, and Chikungunya Viruses in Humans and Colocated Macaques in Thailand and Cambodia

Investigating the Effects of Microclimate on Arboviral Kinetics in Aedes aegypti

Exploring the transmission modalities of Bunyamwera virus

Predicting severe COVID-19 using readily available admission indicators: SpO2/FiO2 ratio, comorbidity index, and gender

Assessment of risk factors associated with and practices of cattle farmers in Kirehe District Rwanda with respect to vector-borne and zoonotic pathogens

Long-term trends and spatial patterns of West Nile Virus emergence in California, 2004–2021

Arbovirus Ecology & Epidemiology

Rebecca Christofferson is a PhD-trained virologist and infectious disease epidemiology experienced in translating complex data into actionable insights. Her work spans laboratory and field-based research on vector-borne viruses, outbreak modeling and response, and translational outreach grounded in public health impact and global biosecurity.

Neglected Tropical Diseases

Viruses

Epidemiology

Infectious Disases

Biosecurity

Diagnostics

LSU Faculty Profile 

The Christofferson Laboratory

Google Scholar

America’s first severe case of bird flu confirmed in Louisiana

LSU Vet Professor weighs in on potential poultry vaccine for bird flu

One bird flu case found in Louisiana out of 60 in the country this year

Researchers develop saliva-based test to make COVID-19 easier to track

Rebecca Christofferson Sheds Light on Virus Transmission Through Mosquito Research

Rebecca Christofferson

Dr. Rebecca Christofferson

what-the-first-us-chikungunya-virus-case-means-lsu-expert-breaks-it-down

"It isn’t terribly surprising that we’d eventually have a case"

Associate Professor

  "The main vector in the US, Aedes albopictus, is known to have been there so it isn’t terribly surprising that we’d eventually have a case.

 
The fact that is was a local transmission case – meaning that a mosquito transmitted it to someone who had not traveled outside the area – is a bit concerning and points to a couple of things:

 
We need more surveillance for these types of viruses; the fact that it got here means likely someone who had traveled brought it back from their vacation

The surveillance infrastructure via the CDC and federal funding has been gutted – which of course is problematic when we have these sorts of introductions occurring.

These types of mosquitoes go a little quiet in the fall/winter because it gets too cool for them to be as active as say the summertime. They’re lucky it’s in the fall and not at the start of summer, where the weather would be more conducive to MORE transmission. HOWEVER, as weather patterns change from a combination of climate change and urban development (which creates more heated areas), we’re going to see the times that these mosquitoes are more active becoming longer – which will again mean more opportunities for transmission.

 
Of course, in Louisiana, these mosquitoes are active for a lot of the year. 

We have good mosquito control, but anyone who sits outside will tell you that doesn’t eliminate biting (though imagine if we didn’t have it) we need to stay vigilant and support the systems that protect us: mosquito abatement, federal and state surveillance, and the science and research that supports our ability to recognize and respond to outbreaks."

Dr. Christofferson's recent research publications in this area:     

What the First U.S. Chikungunya Virus Case Means: LSU Expert Breaks It Down

https://www.ibiology.org/microbiology/arbovirus

Rebecca Christofferson provides an overview of arboviruses, arthropod-borne viruses, like dengue and zika, and shares her work on characterizing understudied arboviruses like Bunyamwera, Batai, and Ngari. 

In part 1, Dr. Rebecca Christofferson provides an overview of arboviruses, arthropod-borne viruses, like dengue. Arthropods, such as mosquitoes, act as vectors to transmit diseases to vertebrates, including humans. Christofferson studies arthropod-virus-vertebrate interactions and how environmental factors affect disease transmission. For example, she explains how environmental factors, like changes in temperature and drought, affect the intrinsic ability of a vector to transmit a pathogen (vector competence).

In her second talk, Christofferson uses the Aedes aegypti-Zika system to explain how mosquito-life traits can be used to understand the process of vector competence. Zika is an arbovirus that is transmitted to humans via the Aedes aegypti mosquito. Christofferson measures how much time it takes for a mosquito to become infectious after its initial exposure (extrinsic incubation period) in order to understand how mosquito age interacts with the viral fitness measure of vector competence. This is done in the context of a commonly used mathematical framework, vectorial capacity.

Christofferson also works on characterizing understudied arboviruses like Bunyamwera, Batai, and Ngari, all of which are orthobunyaviruses. First, in the laboratory, her lab studied the growth of these Orthobunyaviruses in-vitro and investigated a mouse model to determine the cross-reactivity of these viruses. In addition, in collaboration with scientists in Rwanda, Christofferson investigated whether Bunyamwera, Batai and Ngari circulated in the country, and caused disease in cattle. As Christofferson explains, a better understanding of the prevalence of viruses that affects the cattle may alleviate misdiagnosis and allows us to follow the possible emergence of newly detected viruses.

Speaker Biography:
Dr. Rebecca Christofferson is an Assistant Professor at Louisiana State University in the School of Veterinary Medicine. She completed her bachelors in Zoology (2002), her Masters in Applied Statistics (2005), and her doctoral degree (2011) at Louisiana State University. In 2015, she joined the faculty at Louisiana State University, where her laboratory studies mosquito-borne arboviruses, including the impact of environmental factors in the infectious capacity of the mosquito. Visit her lab website, and learn more about Christofferson’s research:
https://www.xoffersonlab.com

Rebecca Christofferson (LSU) 1: Mosquito-Borne Arboviruses

Rebecca Christofferson (LSU) 2: Math and Mosquitoes

Want to maximize your health from viruses carried by mosquitoes and other arthropods? Rebecca Christofferson suggests taking an environmentalist approach. In this talk, Rebecca explains how viruses are transmitted from human to mosquito to human. Surprise: the way to stop the spread of these viruses is not through killing all mosquitoes. Learn what you can do for the environment that will help us all live healthier lives. When faced with the challenge of investigating potentially deadly virus transmission, Rebecca Christofferson started with a familiar face - the mosquito. An assistant professor in Pathobiological Sciences with the Vector-borne Disease Laboratories (http://www.lsu.edu/vetmed/pbs/research/vector_borne_diseases/index.php) at the LSU School of Veterinary Medicine, a large part of Rebecca’s research focuses on how and when mosquitoes carry viruses to uncover the patterns that dictate why and when humans get sick. Her mosquito-related work began a decade ago when tropical viruses such as dengue began to emerge in the continental United States. Today, Rebecca is a leading researcher on the Zika virus, which has spread to more than 60 countries in South and Central America, as well as the United States. In 2016, Rebecca was awarded a $1.2 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences/National Institutes of Health to study the transmission of the Zika and chikungunya viruses. She is currently investigating how environmental factors affect mosquito lifespans and their ability to transmit viruses to susceptible hosts, such as humans. Rebecca and her lab hope their research will help inform methods for controlling and preventing the spread of infections through human populations. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

Why killing all mosquitoes will not save humanity | Rebecca Christofferson | TEDxLSU

Rebecca Christofferson (LSU) 3: Characterizing Understudied Arboviruses: Orthobunyaviruses in Rwanda

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