Dr Simon Carpenter

Gnatwork Director

Dr Simon Carpenter has worked for nineteen years on Culicoides biting midges and the pathogens that they transmit. During this time, he has published over 70 papers on the biology and ecology of these arbovirus vectors and conducted studies in the field and laboratory in the Mediterranean Basin, India, Brazil and South Africa. Dr Carpenter has also led a previous BBSRC funded network on Culicoides in India (IBVNet) and participated in three network-based EU projects on vectors (Medreonet; EDENext and Vectornet). He has recently co-organised the largest ever symposium specifically on Culicoides ecology and biology at ICE in Orlando, Florida and acts as a founder member of the OIE policy working group on the genus. Dr Carpenter possess unrivalled links within the community, both through the pathogen reference laboratories maintained at The Pirbright Institute and his own field- and laboratory-based studies.