Ruth Aguilar is a Staff Scientist at the Infection and Vaccine Immunology group in ISGlobal. She has more than 10 years of expertise in malaria parasitology and immunology in Africa.

She was a postdoctoral fellow at the Malaria Research Institute in the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore (2004-2006), working on several studies that involved state-of-the-art molecular biology and functional genomics of the mosquito-malaria system.

In 2006 she joined the Barcelona Centre for International Health Research (CRESIB, now ISGlobal) as a Research Associate working at the Manhiça Health Research Center (CISM) in Mozambique. At CISM she coordinated the development of several studies on the parasitology and immunology of malaria in the laboratory, being responsible for standard operating procedure development and implementation, sample processing, and training and supervision of the lab personnel.

During 2008-2013 she was a senior postdoctoral fellow at ISGlobal working on the study of the etiology and risk factors of anemia in children from Manhiça. Since 2014, she is Staff Scientist within the Infection and Vaccine Immunology Group with a transversal role supporting the PIs in the technical supervision and coordination of laboratory activities related to studies on the immune response to natural and vaccine induced responses in malaria, COVID-19 and other infections. The group also studies changes in the immunological profile in front environmental exposures. Luminex and cytometry assays are the main approach for the serology, biomarker and cellular research performed by the group.

Lines of research

• Study of the factors involved the development of naturally acquired immunity to malaria.
• Study of the immune response to the RTS,S malaria vaccine candidate and its associations to risk/protection of clinical malaria. 
• Study of biomarkers associated to tolerance/susceptibility to clinical malaria. 
• Study of the antibody and cellular response in SARS-CoV-2 exposed and vaccinated individuals and their kinetics in different cohorts. 
• Study of the factors associated to the persistence of symptoms in the long COVID-19 patients.

Main publications

• Antibody conversion rates to SARS-CoV-2 in saliva from children attending summer schools in Barcelona, Spain. Dobaño C, Alonso S, Fernández de Sevilla M, Vidal M, Jiménez A, Pons Tomas G, Jairoce C, Melé Casas M, Rubio R, Hernández García M, Ruiz-Olalla G, Girona-Alarcón M, Barrios D, Santano R, Mitchell RA, Puyol L, Mayer L, Chi J, Rodrigo Melero N, Carolis C, Garcia-Miquel A, Bonet-Carne E, Claverol J, Cubells M, Fortuny C, Fumadó V, Jou C, Muñoz-Almagro C, Izquierdo L, Bassat Q, Gratacós E, Aguilar R, García-García JJ, Moncunill G, Jordan I.BMC Med. 2021 Nov 23;19(1):309. doi: 10.1186/s12916-021-02184-1.PMID: 34809617.
• Seven-month kinetics of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies and role of pre-existing antibodies to human coronaviruses. Ortega N, Ribes M, Vidal M, Rubio R, Aguilar R, Williams S, Barrios D, Alonso S, Hernández-Luis P, Mitchell RA, Jairoce C, Cruz A, Jimenez A, Santano R, Méndez S, Lamoglia M, Rosell N, Llupià A, Puyol L, Chi J, Melero NR, Parras D, Serra P, Pradenas E, Trinité B, Blanco J, Mayor A, Barroso S, Varela P, Vilella A, Trilla A, Santamaria P, Carolis C, Tortajada M, Izquierdo L, Angulo A, Engel P, García-Basteiro AL, Moncunill G, Dobaño C. Nat Commun. 2021 Aug 6;12(1):4740. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-24979-9.PMID: 34362897.
• Persistence and baseline determinants of seropositivity and reinfection rates in health care workers up to 12.5 months after COVID-19. Dobaño C, Ramírez-Morros A, Alonso S, Vidal-Alaball J, Ruiz-Olalla G, Vidal M, Rubio R, Cascant E, Parras D, Rodrigo Melero N, Serra P, Carolis C, Santamaria P, Forcada A, Mendioroz J, Aguilar R, Moncunill G, Ruiz-Comellas A. BMC Med. 2021 Jun 28;19(1):155. doi: 10.1186/s12916-021-02032-2.PMID: 34183003. 
• Seroprevalence of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 among health care workers in a large Spanish reference hospital. Garcia-Basteiro AL, Moncunill G, Tortajada M, Vidal M, Guinovart C, Jiménez A, Santano R, Sanz S, Méndez S, Llupià A, Aguilar R, Alonso S, Barrios D, Carolis C, Cisteró P, Chóliz E, Cruz A, Fochs S, Jairoce C, Hecht J, Lamoglia M, Martínez MJ, Mitchell RA, Ortega N, Pey N, Puyol L, Ribes M, Rosell N, Sotomayor P, Torres S, Williams S, Barroso S, Vilella A, Muñoz J, Trilla A, Varela P, Mayor A, Dobaño C. Nat Commun. 2020 Jul 8;11(1):3500. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-17318-x.PMID: 32641730.
• Concentration and avidity of antibodies to different circumsporozoite epitopes correlate with RTS,S/AS01E malaria vaccine efficacy. Dobaño C, Sanz H, Sorgho H, Dosoo D, Mpina M, Ubillos I, Aguilar R, Ford T, Díez-Padrisa N, Williams NA, Ayestaran A, Traore O, Nhabomba AJ, Jairoce C, Waitumbi J, Agnandji ST, Kariuki S, Abdulla S, Aponte JJ, Mordmüller B, Asante KP, Owusu-Agyei S, Tinto H, Campo JJ, Moncunill G, Gyan B, Valim C, Daubenberger C. Nat Commun. 2019 May 15;10(1):2174. doi: 10.1038/s41467-019-10195-z.PMID: 31092823.