APHIS HomeAbout APHISNewsroomCareer OpportunitiesHelpContact Us
Decrease Font Size Increase Font Size
Search

USDA in Facebook APHIS in Twitter APHIS in Youtube APHIS Stakeholder Registry APHIS in Pictures APHIS in Blog APHIS RSS News Feeds

Browse by Subject
Animal Health
Animal Welfare
Biotechnology
Emergency Preparedness and Response
Import and Export
International Services
Permits
Plant Health
Regulations and Assessments
APHIS User Fees
Wildlife Control and Management
Wildlife Damage
USDA - APHIS - Wildlife Damage

National Wildlife Research Center (NWRC)

Divider

Amy Gilbert

Dr. Amy Turmelle Gilbert,
Research Biologist

Contact Information:

NWRC Research Project: Rabies

Dr. Gilbert is a disease ecologist interested in the maintenance and spillover of wildlife diseases, with a focus on rabies. She earned a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee studying rabies virus ecology in North American bats. She was a guest researcher and postdoctoral fellow with the Rabies Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for 7 years, where she conducted studies on rabies pathogenesis in bats and both led and participated in international field projects focused on enhanced lyssavirus surveillance and pathogen discovery in bats, as well as human-animal interface studies for modeling rabies risk. Her current research focuses on ecology and spillover of rabies infections in wildlife, as well as experimental studies of novel rabies biologics and technologies to improve oral rabies vaccination of target wildlife, in efforts to improve disease management.

Expertise Keywords
Rabies, zoonotic diseases, wildlife epidemiology, human-animal interface, ecology, bats

Taxonomic Groups of Interest:
Bats, carnivores, small mammals

Areas of Expertise:
Rabies, epidemiology, wildlife diseases, population ecology

Current Research

  • Ecology and spillover of rabies infections in wildlife
  • Aapplication of novel rabies biologics and technologies to improve vaccination of target wildlife
  • Human-animal interface and zoonotic disease risk
  • Emerging pathogens of bats

Education

Ph.D., University of Tennessee
B.A., Boston University

Awards, Distinctions:

EPA Science to Achieve Results Fellow

Previous Positions:

  • ORISE Postdoctoral Fellow, CDC
  • Science to Achieve Results Graduate Fellow, EPA
  • Graduate Research Assistant, University of Tennessee

International Experience:

Pathogen surveillance in bats and human knowledge-attitude-practice surveys in Mexico, Guatemala, Peru, Kenya, Uganda, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Thailand

Publications:

Turmelle, A., F. Jackson, D. Green, G. McCracken and C. Rupprecht. 2010. Host immunity to repeated rabies virus infection in big brown bats (Eptesicus fuscus). Journal of General Virology 91:2360-2366

Streicker D., A. Turmelle, M. Vonhof, I. Kuzmin, G. McCracken and C. Rupprecht. 2010. Host phylogeny constrains cross-species emergence and establishment of rabies virus in bats. Science 329:676-679
Turmelle, A., T. Kunz and M. Sorenson. 2011. A tale of two genomes: contrasting patterns of phylogeographic structure in a broadly-distributed bat. Molecular Ecology 20:357-375

Rupprecht, C., A. Turmelle and I. Kuzmin. 2011. A perspective on lyssavirus emergence and perpetuation. Current Opinions in Virology 1:662-670.

Tong, S., Y. Li, P. Rivailler, C. Conrardy, et al. 2012. A distinct lineage of influenza A virus from bats. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 109:4269-74

Gilbert, A., B. Petersen, S. Recuenco, M. Niezgoda, J. Gómez, V.A. Laguna-Torres and C. Rupprecht. 2012. Evidence of rabies virus exposure among humans in the Peruvian Amazon. American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene 87:206-215

Hayman, D., R. Bowen, P. Cryan, G. McCracken, T. O’Shea, A. Peel, A. Gilbert, C. Webb, J. Wood. 2013. Ecology of zoonotic infectious diseases in bats: current knowledge and future directions. Zoonoses and Public Health 60:2-21

Ellison, J.A., S. Johnson, N. Kuzmina, A. Gilbert, W. Carson, K. VerCauteren, C. Rupprecht.2013. Multidisciplinary approach to epizootiology and pathogenesis of bat rabies viruses in the United States. Zoonoses and Public Health 60:46-57

Luis, A.D., D. Hayman, T. O’Shea, et al. 2013. A comparison of bats and rodents as reservoirs of zoonotic viruses: Are bats special? Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, B. Biological Sciences doi: 10.1098/rspb.2012.2753

Kim, B., J. Blanton, A. Gilbert, L. Castrodale, K. Hueffer, D. Slate, C. Rupprecht. 2013. A conceptual model for the impact of climate change on fox rabies in Alaska, 1980-2010. Zoonoses and Public Health doi: 10.1111/zph.12044

Quan, P-L., C. Firth, J. Conte, et al. 2013. Bats are a major natural reservoir for hepaciviruses and pegiviruses. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, doi/10.1073/pnas.1303037110

Last Modified: May 2, 2013