Bert Semler received his undergraduate degree in biological sciences at UC Irvine, where he carried out research in synthetic organic chemistry. He then attended graduate school at UC San Diego. There he joined the laboratory of Dr. John Holland and carried out his dissertation research on the genetic determinants of the replication of vesicular stomatitis virus defective interfering particles and the error-prone replication of RNA viruses. Semler went on to carry out postdoctoral research with Dr. Eckard Wimmer at the State University of New York at Stony Brook (now called Stony Brook University), where he began his lifelong research on picornavirus molecular biology, with an initial focus on poliovirus protein processing and RNA replication. He then made his way back to southern California to establish his own laboratory at UC Irvine in the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics in the School of Medicine, where he has been a faculty member since 1983.

Semler’s ongoing research focuses on gene expression of picornaviruses and the complex virus-host interactions resulting from infections by these genetically-simple RNA viruses, including those that promote the establishment of enterovirus persistent infections. His research has also branched out into non-canonical host cell translation initiation, the generation of recombinant rabies virus vectors for neural circuit mapping, and host signaling pathways in cells infected by RNA viruses.