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职称:Professor and Director
所属学校:University of Georgia
所属院系:Arts and Sciences
所属专业:Microbiology, General
联系方式:(706) 542-4112
Our laboratory uses field-based, cellular and molecular approaches to further an understanding of the immunobiology of schistosomiasis in people. We focus on immunoregulation and resistance to reinfection. Schistosomiasis is a parasitic worm infection that people acquire by going into fresh water that contains schistosome-infected snails, the intermediate host. Globally, about 200 million people are infected with this intravascular worm. Twenty million of those infected suffer severe, life-threatening disease, while at least another 100 million experience more subtle morbidity, such as cognitive and physiologic deficits due to their schistosomiasis.
This makes it a major public health threat in endemic areas of the world. Schistosomes live for years inside the blood vessels of those infected. There the female worms produce large numbers of eggs, which the males fertilize. Some of the eggs are excreted out of the body and get into fresh water, to complete the life cycle. However some of the eggs are swept by the blood flow to the liver and other organs, where they induce morbidity - which may primarily be due to host immune responses against the eggs. Our research seeks to understand the roles of the immune system in the regulation and resistance observed during this chronic disease, and investigates how to translate our findings to contribute to the control of its transmission and the widespread morbidity it causes. In addition, because of the chronic nature of schistosomiasis, a better understanding of the immune interactions in this setting may shed light on other chronic antigenic exposures, such as organ transplantation, autoimmune diseases and cancer.
