Translational Medicine
Open Access

Gordana Blagojevic Zagorac

Biography

Gordana Blagojevic Zagorac is an associate professor at the Department of Physiology and Immunology in the Medical Faculty, University of Rijeka, where she obtained her PhD degree in Biomedicine. She has 14 years working experience in the field of cellular physiology and virology research. Currently, the focus of her research is the remodulation of cellular endosomal compartments during murine cytomegalovirus infection by which viruses can escape from the immune system of the host. G. Blagojevic Zagorac participated in realization of several scientific projects, first as a young research fellow and now as a principal investigator. She has presented her work in numerous international conferences and has published 14 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, indexed in CC database. She is a reviewer of Croatian Medical Journal.G. Blagojevic Zagorac is skilled in planning, development and execution of high impact research in biomedical science. She is a member of several associations related to her research field.

Research Interest

The focus of my current research is remodulation of early and late endosomal compartments during the murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV) infection. Namely, MCMV is virus with highly developed immunoevasive strategy. Upon infection, it reorganizes endosomal system of the host cell and downregulates surface MHC class I molecules with the ultimate goal to replicate itself. The endosomal reorganization starts early in the infection and continues throughout the entire replication cycle until the assembly compartment is established at the beginning of the late phase of infection. Considering that small GTPases from Arf and Rab family have important role in regulation of vesicular trafficking, determination of the role of Arf and Rab proteins in the MCMV pathogenesis and their influence on the surface expression of MHC class I molecules during the MCMV infection is one of the main goals of my research.