Nischay Mishra

Residency: Columbia Global Center Mumbai

Research: Advanced Diagnostics and One Health Partnerships for Emerging Infections and Undiagnosed Syndromes in India

Nischay Mishra is an Associate Professor of Epidemiology at Columbia University and his research is focused on emerging infectious diseases, pathogen discovery, disease surveillance, One Health, and viral infections and reactivations in post-infectious syndromes, including Long COVID and ME/CFS. 

At Columbia University’s Center for Infection and Immunity, he contributed to pathogen-discovery assays, including VirCapSeq and BacCapSeq, and led developing molecular diagnostic assays, including FDA EUA assays for Zika virus and SARS-CoV-2, and serological assays for Zika, dengue, Ebola, Nipah, and Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever viruses. He has developed advanced serological platforms, including high-density peptide microarrays, short-peptide phage display libraries, and high-density protein arrays for microbial, host, and autoimmune serology. 

His research contributed to the discovery of Tilapia lake virus and New Jersey polyomavirus; identification of the MERS-CoV bat reservoir in Saudi Arabia; characterization of Human Polyomavirus 9 pathogenicity in immunocompromised patients; and characterization of a novel Pteropine orthoreovirus causing Nipah-like illness in Bangladesh. Using high-throughput serology, his work established the role of enterovirus D68 in acute flaccid myelitis in the United States. In India, he identified scrub typhus, rickettsial infections, and viral co-infections as major causes of Acute Encephalitis Syndrome in children. Mishra’s research advances role of viral infections in acute disease and their long-term impact on chronic illness.