By UM News —

UM tropical disease specialist Paola N. Lichtenberger, M.D., is hard at work understanding the spread of the Zika virus in South Florida and other tropical climates.

Paola N. Lichtenberger, M.D., is an assistant professor of clinical medicine and director of the tropical disease program. Lichtenberger’s research focuses on infectious and tropical diseases. She has been working with David Watkins, Ronald Desrosiers, and investigators at the University of São Paulo, Brazil, and the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, taking a preventative approach in studying the virus by using antibodies from Zika patients. Lichtenberger discusses here how South Florida’s tropical climate made it particularly vulnerable to the Zika outbreak in 2016, and steps that individuals can take to reduce the likelihood of being infected with the virus.