Emerging viral infections are an ever-present threat to human health. The risk of transmission of viruses to previously unexposed populations has increased as a result of increased global travel, global warming and changes in our ecosystem and human behaviour. I have worked on a number of emerging viral infections including hepatitis C and E, Ebola virus, emerging rhabdoviruses in Uganda, CCHF and most recently SARS-CoV-2. My laboratory uses next generation sequencing methods to detect new and emerging viruses in Uganda and in the UK in febrile undiagnosed patients. We are also engaged in improving diagnosis of human viral pathogens so that undiagnosed new or emerging infections may be detected at source in the future, allowing more rapid control interventions. My team investigate drivers of virus evolution using B and T cell functional assays including neutralization, ELISpot and flow cytometry. In February 2020 we commenced sequencing of the novel corona-virus SARS2-CoV within the UK and have now sequenced >5000 genomes as part of the COG-UK consortium