Assistant professor
dr. Rajagopal Murugan
Curriculum Vitae
I am a molecular immunologist focused on understanding how pathogen-specific adaptive immunity develops and protects humans. To that end, we develop advanced single-cell and multi-omics approaches to uncover mechanisms of protective immunity against infectious diseases, with specific focus on malaria. With the interest in studying host-pathogen interactions, I performed doctoral and postdoctoral work in the lab of Prof. Hedda Wardemann at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, Berlin and German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg. This work unveiled the role of germline antibody binding to complex malaria antigen and how this could be used to design next generation immunogens to induce protective immune response. Impact of the findings was recognized by the German Society of Immunology (DGfI) by awarding Werner Muller award in 2019. Since joining LUMC in 2022, I have established an independent research group, advancing whole-organism malaria vaccines.
Research
My research program investigates how antigen-specific B and T cells are recruited, activated, and differentiated to generate protective immunity. Supported by major funding, including ERC Starting Grant and LUMC Junior PI fellowship, I develop innovative multi-omics strategies to study rare antigen-specific B cells and T cells and examine how co-infections can impair vaccine responses. My broader vision is to uncover why some vaccines induce long-lived immunity while others fail, using comparative studies across diseases. By combining fundamental immunology with clinical data, my work aims to define durable immune memory and guide next-generation vaccines with lasting global health impact.
Publications
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Correlative humoral and cellular immunity to genetically attenuated malaria parasites in humans.
Colstrup E, Nakajima R, Krol J, Lamers O, Iliopoulou E, de Bes-Roeleveld H, Franke-Fayard B, Roestenberg M, Felgner P, Murugan R.
iScience. 2025 May 5;28(6):112589.
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Safety and Efficacy of Immunization with a Late-Liver-Stage Attenuated Malaria Parasite.
Lamers OAC, Franke-Fayard BMD, Koopman JPR, Roozen GVT, Janse JJ, Chevalley-Maurel SC, Geurten FJA, de Bes-Roeleveld HM, Iliopoulou E, Colstrup E, Wessels E, van Gemert GJ, [...] Murugan R, McCall MBB, Janse CJ, Roestenberg M.
New England Journal of Medicine. 2024 Nov 21;391(20):1913-1923.
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Affinity-independent memory B cell origin of the early antibody-secreting cell response in naive individuals upon SARS-CoV-2 vaccination.
Li Z, Obraztsova A, Shang F, Oludada OE, Malapit J, Busch K, van Straaten M, Stebbins E, Murugan R, Wardemann H.
Immunity. 2024 Sep 10;57(9):2191-2201.e5.
Groups:
Molecular Immunology
