Dr Syed Iqbal is currently serving as an Assistant Professor at the Y.R. Gaitonde Centre for AIDS Research and Education (YRG CARE), Chennai. He has been working on research studies about HIV and co-infections for the past few years and also on HIV diagnosis and other co-infections. He has also worked on HIV-1 sequencing and molecular characterisation for his Ph.D. programme and has explored HIV-1 Drug resistance, polymorphisms and phylogenetic analysis in clients receiving voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) and people who inject drugs (PWID). Additionally, he has developed a research interest in studying inflammatory and immune activation markers in persons with HIV. Dr Iqbal has closely worked on immunological assays; with the recently completed ‘Indo-US Proposal’ titled ‘Immune Activation in Virologically Suppressed Indian HIV-Infected Patients’ Study (ICMR Ref #: HIV/INDO-US/149/9/2012-ECD-II). He has also been involved in measuring neutralising antibodies in persons with HIV for the study from ‘Global HIV/AIDS Vaccine Enterprise (GHAVE); Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery / Comprehensive Antibody Vaccine Immune Monitoring consortium (CAVD/CA-VIMC)’. He has also received a grant titled ‘Study on the Hepatitis B Virus Vaccine Response among persons with HIV-1, a Multicentre Study’ from Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR); New Delhi, Government of India. Dr Iqbal has made considerable contributions to HIV serological assays including HIV diagnosis, low-cost monitoring and detuned assays.