Tick-borne Bourbon virus infects people, wildlife in St. Louis area

The Source, Washington University in St. Louis • June 22, 2023July 25, 2023

Jacco Boon holds a lone star tick collected at Washington University’s Tyson Research Center. Lone star ticks can carry the potentially deadly Bourbon virus. Boon and his colleagues are studying this virus and how it travels through wildlife and to people. (Photo: Matt Miller/School of Medicine)

Jacco Boon, PhD, associate professor of Medicine, Molecular Microbiology and Pathology and Immunology, has received more than $4 million in grant funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) since he first started to study the Bourbon Virus. He is the principal investigator on two NIH grants and a co-investigator on another two grants to study the virus.