Through the ‘Bats & Coronaviruses’ project, Dr. Andrew Spalton and his team from the Office for Conservation of the Environment (OCE) collaborate with WAB-Net partners to characterize the diversity of bats and bat-borne coronaviruses (CoVs) in Oman, and test key hypotheses about bat-borne zoonotic virus emergence risk within Western Asia. As part of this project, Dr. Spalton and his team have received training in best practices for bat sampling and biosafety (for additional details, see our discussion of ‘Field Training’ here), and are actively capturing bats and collecting non-lethal diagnostic samples at multiple sites in Oman. As a wildlife biologist, Dr. Spalton serves as an invaluable member of WAB-Net, and is able to leverage his 30+ years of studying mammalian biology in Oman to improve field sampling efforts and our understanding of bat species native to the country.

Bats of Oman: (26 species)