MMI’s Conor McMeniman Promoted to Associate Professor

Conor McMeniman, PhD, a faculty member in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, has been promoted to associate professor. McMeniman studies the molecular and cellular basis of mosquito attraction to humans. 

Born and raised in Brisbane, Australia, McMeniman received his PhD in Biological Science in 2009 from The University of Queensland. During his PhD studies, McMeniman established various strains of the bacterium Wolbachia pipientis from Drosophila melanogaster in the yellow fever mosquito Aedes aegypti. This work with Scott O’Neill, PhD, yielded a novel self-sustaining strategy to block transmission of dengue and other viruses in wild mosquito populations using Wolbachia; currently deployed in over 12 countries worldwide to improve public health. 

From 2009–2015, McMeniman was a Human Frontier Science Program postdoctoral fellow at The Rockefeller University with Leslie B. Vosshall, PhD. This work illuminated the molecular mechanics of Aedes aegypti CO2 detection and the key role that multisensory integration plays in driving mosquito attraction towards humans. 

McMeniman has published 28 research articles and reviews in journals including Cell, Nature, Science, Current Biology, and Genetics. In 2015, McMeniman joined the Bloomberg School as assistant professor and established the McMeniman Lab. Since joining the Bloomberg School, McMeniman has developed the world’s largest multi-choice smell test for mosquitoes in collaboration with partners in Zambia, identifying features of human scent chemistry modulating human attractiveness to mosquitoes.