Wenhan Zhu received his Ph.D. at Purdue University in Biological Sciences and is an Assistant Professor in Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology. In his lab, they focus on the metabolic interactions that dictate the changes or resilience of the microbiota. Insight into such interactions could enable precise manipulation of gut microbiota composition, thus restoring a balanced community in situ and improving host health. To precisely manipulate the microbiota, they use a multidisciplinary discovery pipeline that consists of next-generation sequencing, bacterial genetics and a mechanistic understanding of bacterial physiology in vivo. This pipeline allows them to discover druggable targets of the microbiota and translate the findings using high-throughput screening.... Click Dr. Zhu's photo to continue reading.

Exhausted-like CD8 T cell phenotypes linked to C-peptide preservation in alefacept-treated T1D subjects. Diggins K, et al. in JCI Insight, December 22, 2020 Interactions between host genetics and gut microbiota determine susceptibility to CNS autoimmunity. Montgomery T, et al.

Melissa is a graduate student in the Program in Cancer Biology. She is part of the Kim Rathmell lab where she investigates the relationship between infiltrating immune cells and RCC tumor cells and the metabolic programs they employ to drive tumor progression and therapeutic resistance... Click the image on the left to continue reading.

Brian Bachmann received his PhD at Johns Hopkins University in 2000 and is a Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry. He is the Principal Investigator of the Laboratory for Biosynthetic Studies, a multidisciplinary group working on the construction and deconstruction of biosynthetic pathways and the discovery of their products. The broad goals of this group are to investigate how natural product biosynthetic enzymes evolve and to understand the design rules for their concatenation into efficient “total syntheses” of natural products. Click Dr. Bachmann's photo to continue reading.

Metabolic RNA labeling for probing RNA dynamics in bacteria. Meng L, et al. in Nucleic Acids Research, December 16, 2020 Infection trains the host for microbiota-enhanced resistance to pathogens. Stacy A, et al. in Cell, January 15, 2021 The Identity of Human Tissue-Emigrant CD8+ T Cells. Buggert M, et al.

Maureen Gannon grew up in Queens, New York. She received her B.S. in Biology from Molloy College in Rockville Centre, NY and her M.S. in Biology from Adelphi University in Garden City, NY. She received her Ph.D. in Cell Biology and Anatomy from Cornell University. Her thesis project, conducted in the lab of Dr. David Bader, examined cardiac organogenesis and the formation of the chambers of the heart in the developing embryo. Dr. Gannon pursued her postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Dr. Chris Wright at Vanderbilt University, where she studied genes that regulate embryonic pancreas development and expression of the insulin gene... Click Dr. Gannon's photo to continue reading.

Karissa is a first-generation college student from Murphy, North Carolina. She started off her undergraduate journey at Young Harris College in north Georgia and then transferred to North Carolina State University to pursue her BS in microbiology. After graduating she then attended the University of Tennessee in Knoxville to pursue her PhD in microbiology. During this time, she worked with Dr. Mircea Podar at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to develop methods to culture the yet-uncultured bacteria in the human oral cavity and investigate what changes bacteria undergo when transitioning to host-associated environments. In June of 2019, Karissa came to Vanderbilt University to pursue a postdoctoral position with Dr. Seth Bordenstein, and to continue her interests in studying microorganisms at the host-microbe interface using the Nasonia parasitoid wasp model system... Click the image on the left to continue reading

Viruses exist in a constant arms race with the host's immune system. As the immune system fights off a virus, the pressure will force the virus to either adapt or disappear. Typos, or mutations, made in the genetic code as viruses replicate enable these adaptations. Many of these mutations are bad for the virus or have little effect, but what if one of these mutations makes the virus better at replicating? In that case, the descendants of that virus will carry the change forward as they spread, and those new viruses will have an advantage over others that lack that particular mutation. We are watching this process unfold right now as new variants of SARS-CoV-2 threaten our current public health efforts. As the virus changes, we may need to adapt our strategies to remain ahead of SARS-CoV-2... Click the image to continue reading.

Reduced Lymphatic Reserve in Heart Failure With Preserved Ejection Fraction. Rossitto G, et al. in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, December 15, 2020 Intracellular immune sensing promotes inflammation via gasdermin D–driven release of a lectin alarmin. Russo A, et al.

Darian is originally from Spartanburg, South Carolina. She received her Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from Clemson University in 2018. She is a graduate student in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program (IGP). Darian is part of the Maureen Gannon lab where she investigates how maternal diet and metformin intake influence pancreatic beta cell development in offspring. They work in a multi-institutional non human primate consortium that investigates the impact of in utero exposure to diet on fetal development... Click the image on the left to continue reading.