Kevin Alby

I am currently doing research in Dr. Bennett's lab. My research interest is in defining the roles that the mating cycle of the human fungal pathogen Candida albicans play in the pathogenesis of the organism.

Funding

1. F31 Predoctoral Fellowship: Sex and Disease: The Candida albicans mating cycle and candidiasis.

Awards

1. Eukaryotic Cell Outstanding Young Investigator Award, 9th ASM Conference on Candida and Candidiasis 2008

Publications

1. Forche, A., Alby, K., Schaefer, D., Johnson, A.D., Berman, J. and Bennett, R.J. (2008) The Parasexual Cycle in Candida albicans Provides an Alternative Pathway to Meiosis for the Formation of Recombinant Strains. PLoS Biology. 6: e110.(2008)
2. Alby, K. and Bennett, R.J. Stress-Induced Phenotypic Switching in Candida albicans. Mol. Biol. Cell. 20: 3178-91.(2009)
3. Alby, K., Schaefer, D., and Bennett, R.J. Homothallic and Heterothallic mating in the opportunistic pathogen Candida albicans. Nature 460:890-893.(2009)
4. Alby, K. and Bennett, R.J. To Switch or Not to Switch? Phenotypic switching is sensitive to multiple inputs in a pathogenic fungus. Communicative and Integrative Biology. 2:6, 1-3.(2009)

Cindy Banh

I work in Prof. Brossay's lab. My research interest is defining mechanisms to de-mystify diseases.

Awards/Grants

1. Charles A. Janeway Memorial Award, Best Poster, New England Immunology Conference (2008)
2. June Rockwell Levy Pre-doctoral Travel Award (2009)
3. NIH NRSA Fellowship Award

Publications

1. 1. Liu Y, Dargusch R, Banh C, Miller CA, and Schubert D. Detecting bioactive amyloid beta peptide species in Alzheimer's disease. J Neurochem. 2004 Nov;91(3):648-56.
2. Pasquetto V, Bui HH, Giannino R, Banh C, Mirza F, Sidney J, Oseroff C, Tscharke DC, Irvine K, Bennink JR, Peters B, Southwood S, Cerundolo V, Grey H, Yewdell JW, and Sette A. HLA-A*0201, HLA-A*1101, and HLA-B*0702 transgenic mice recognize numerous poxvirus determinants from a wide variety of viral gene products. J Immunol. 2005 Oct 15;175(8):5504-15.
3. Cao L, Yu K, Banh C, Nguyen V, Ritz A, Raphael BJ, Kawakami Y, Kawakami T, and Salomon AR. Quantitative time-resolved phosphoproteomic analysis of mast cell signaling. J Immunol. 2007 Nov 1;179(9):5864-76.
4. Banh C and Brossay L. Immune Receptors, Cadherins, and their Interactions. Current Immunology Reviews, 2009 Feb, 5, 2-9.

Meredith Crane

I am currently a 4th year Pathobiology student in Dr. Thais Salazar-Mather's lab. My research focuses on understanding how the innate immune system senses and responds to murine cytomegalovirus infection.

Awards/Grants

1. Nicole Rosenthal Hartnett '91 Graduate Fellowship
2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention R36 Dissertation Grant

Publications

1. Crane MJ, Hokeness-Antonelli KL, Salazar-Mather TP. Regulation of inflammatory monocyte/macrophage recruitment from the bone marrow during murine cytomegalovirus infection: role for type I interferons in localized induction of CCR2 ligands. J. Immunol. 2009 Aug 15;183(4):2810-7.
2. Hokeness-Antonelli KL, Crane MJ, Dragoi AM, Chu WM, Salazar-Mather TP. IFN-alpha/beta-mediated inflammatory responses and antiviral defense in liver is TLR9-independent but MyD88-dependent during murine cytomegalovirus infection. J. Immunol. 2007 Nov 1;179(9):6176-83.

Pamela Gaddi

My current research interest is to investigate the role of interleukin (IL)-10 in the regulation of immune responses to acute murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV) infection. More specifically, I am primarily focusing on the characterization of IL-10's effects on NK cells and CD8 T cell antiviral effector responses in the liver, a key site for early viral replication during acute MCMV infection.

Awards/ Funding

1. NRSA Predoctoral Fellowship (2008-)
2. Brown University Frederic Poole Gorham Endowed Fellowship (2006-07)

Publication

• Gaddi PJ, Yap GS. Cytokine regulation of immunopathology in toxoplasmosis. Immunol Cell Biol.2007 Feb-Mar;85(2):155-9.

Emma Reilly

I am a member of the Brossay lab and my primary research interests relate to the innate immune responses to viruses, specifically non-classical responses.

Awards/Funding

• 2010-present T32 Training Grant Fellowship
• 2008 - 2009 Department of Education GAANN Graduate Training Fellowship

Publication

• Drennan MB, Franki AS, Dewint P, Van Beneden K, Seeuws S, van de Pavert SA, Reilly EC, Verbruggen G, Lane TE, Mebius RE, Deforce D, Elewaut D. Cutting edge: the chemokine receptor CXCR3 retains invariant NK T cells in the thymus. J. Immunol. 183(4):2213-6, 2009.
• Reilly, EC, LD Fast, and L Brossay. The impact of senescent T cells on aging immune systems. Curr. Res. in Immunology 2 :109-119, 2008. (Review)

Racquel "Kim" Sherwood

I completed my undergraduate education at the University of Connecticut in 2001. Currently, I am a 4th year Ph.D candidate of the Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry (MCB) program. My research interests include understanding the molecular mechanisms of ploidy reduction in C. albicans and C. lusitaniae.

• NIH/NIAID F31 Fellowship award "Identification of a Cryptic Meiosis in the Fungal Pathogen C. albicans".

Leon Toussaint

I come from Jamaica, Queens, NY, but am originally from the Island of Dominica in the Caribbean. I am happy to be part of Dr. Laurent Brossay's lab here at the MMI department as a graduate student in the pathobiology program. I am currently having fun working on a challenging project dealing with the intricacies of iNKT cell development.

Awards/Grants

• AAI Minority Scientist Travel Award