Current Research Projects

"Within the Center for Asthma Research, our investigators study ubiquitous and modifiable factors that they have shown to or are hypothesized to, play a causal role in asthma development and to impact the natural history of asthma. We have advanced our understanding of the clinical significance of respiratory infections and oxidant defense in the development of asthma, established the infant viral respiratory illness severity-dependent risk on early childhood asthma development and asthma severity, as well as established the causal role of RSV infection in asthma development. In addition, we have shown that persons with asthma have an increased risk for invasive infections outside the respiratory tract, establishing asthma and allergic diseases as risk factors for vaccine-preventable diseases, work that has led to vaccine policy changes for influenza and pneumococcal vaccine. Our highly collaborative translational research group has established several parallel cohorts aimed at answering important questions related to asthma inception, natural history, and effectiveness of treatment and prevention strategies. The current work of the Center is now extending these findings into proof of concept and early intervention studies moving ever closer to strategies for primary disease prevention."

 Center Director