In my project, I aim to provide insight into the unique biosynthetic potential of cave-dwelling microorganisms and contribute to the discovery of novel antibiotics.

Publications on

Max has longstanding interests in the intersection of intestinal function, microbiota, mucosal immunology, metabolism, nutrition, microbiology, and human disease. He is interested especially in the potential role of microbiota in metabolic syndrome and in the etiology of the increasing incidence of colorectal cancer in individuals below 50 years of age. He plans to become an academic gastroenterologist physician-scientist with clinical duties and a laboratory to one day bridge the exploding basic science findings in the microbiome field with the relative dearth of clinical treatments currently derived from them.

Immunocompromised hosts are a growing population with underserved, yet specific, needs with regards to infectious disease incidence and clinical outcomes. I work to understand the fundamental biochemical, microbiological, and clinical factors that influence infectious outcomes in these highly vulnerable host populations through basic science research on MRSA biofilms in the context of nutritional immunity, and through clinical research on infectious diseases in the post-transplant population.