Since July 2022, Johanna Bouckaert works as a Junior Researcher in the Virology Unit of the ITM. In July 2021, she obtained her master’s degree cum laude in Pharmaceutical Sciences (specialization Drug Development) at KU Leuven. As Ms. Bouckaert has a special interest in flaviviruses, she did her Master’s internship in the Laboratory for Virology and Chemotherapy (Rega Institute for Medical Research, Leuven) led by Professor Johan Neyts. Under the guidance of Doctor Suzanne Kaptein, she wrote her thesis on dengue antiviral compounds that are under development at Janssens Pharmaceutica NV. Within the Virology Unit of the ITM, led by Prof. Kevin Ariën, Ms. Johanna Bouckaert currently focusses on flavivirus peptide-based diagnostics, continuing the work of Francesca Falconi, who discovered several peptide biomarkers for the detection of dengue virus as a former PhD student at the ITM and the Instituto de Medicina Tropical Alexander von Humboldt (Lima, Peru). Additionally, in September 2022, Ms. Bouckaert enrolled in a Master’s program in Infectious and Tropical Diseases at UAntwerp to further broaden and deepen her knowledge and knowhow about arboviruses. Besides, her engagement as a student researcher at KU Leuven (2018-2021) allowed her to explore different laboratory environments and resulted in a co-authorship for two scientific publications on arbovirus vectors in the research group of Professor Leen Delang (Rega Institute for Medical Research, Leuven).