Early career researcher panel

James White, Student and ECR Committee Chair, University of Leeds, UK

James White is a PhD student at the University of Leeds, working in collaboration with the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA).

His research, through the Deer MATRIX project, focuses on developing individual-based models of UK deer populations that integrate ecology, behaviour, movement and disease dynamics to support wildlife management and disease preparedness. His work aims to improve understanding of deer-associated disease risks and provide tools to evaluate management interventions.

As Chair of the Student and Early Career Researcher Committee, James represents the interests of students and early career researchers and helps foster collaboration and engagement across the wildlife disease modelling community. James White - Faculty of Biological Sciences, University of Leeds

Dr Sébastien Lambert, Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire (ENVT), University of Toulouse, France

 Sébastien is a postdoctoral researcher at the veterinary school of Toulouse, France. After graduating as a veterinarian, he pursued a research career in epidemiology and modelling of infectious diseases. His research first cantered on wildlife diseases such as border disease and brucellosis. He then worked on infectious diseases of livestock, mainly highly pathogenic avian influenza. His main focus is now on diseases at the wildlife-livestock interface, with ongoing projects on bovine tuberculosis, avian influenza and African swine fever.

Ashlyn Halseth-Ellis, Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute, Texas A&M University-Kingsville, USA

Ashlyn Halseth-Ellis is a current Ph.D. student at Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute at Texas A&M University-Kingsville in the United States. Her research is focused on chronic wasting disease (CWD) transmission among captive and free-range cervid populations. Specifically, Ashlyn is developing an agent-based model to simulate CWD spread among free-range white-tailed deer, mule deer, and elk and using network theory to identify what trading practices increase captive deer breeding facilities' risk of getting and detecting CWD. Outside of her research, Ashlyn is passionate about using art to connect with and communicate science to the many stakeholders involved in wildlife conservation.

Dr Himel Talukder, Michigan State University, USA

Himel Talukder is an infectious disease epidemiologist and postdoctoral researcher at Michigan State University. His research focuses on the ecology and transmission of emerging and zoonotic diseases at the wildlife-livestock-human interface, with particular emphasis on understanding how wildlife movement, environmental pathways, and animal contact networks shape pathogen spillover. His work integrates spatial epidemiology, disease ecology, animal movement data, and quantitative modelling to identify transmission pathways and inform risk-based surveillance and disease prevention. His current research examines HPAI H5N1 transmission in dairy cattle, including viral shedding, environmental transmission, and implications for animal health and biosecurity.