March 2024

Timothy Nice, Isabella Rauch, Austin Wright, Shelby Madden, Bryan Ramirez Reyes, Alexis Gibson, and David Constant had their paper, "Interferon Regulatory Factor 6 Determines Intestinal Epithelial Cell Development and Immunity," published in Mucosal Immunology. 

Bill Messer had his paper, "Preventing unnecessary urine cultures at a Veteran's affairs healthcare system," published in Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology,

Bahareh Ajami, Aude Chiot, and Paula Sanchez-Molina had their paper, "Cryopreservation of cerebrospinal fluid cells preserves the transcriptional landscape for single-cell analysis," published in the Journal of Neuroinflammation,

Evan Lind, Patrick Flynn, Yoko Kosaka, and Jessica Mulkey had their paper, "Leukemic mutation FLT3-ITD is retained in dendritic cells and disrupts their homeostasis leading to expanded Th17 frequency," published in Frontiers Immunology. 

February 2024

Ph.D. candidate Leah Huey, Ph.D. Program in Biomedical Sciences (PBMS), was awarded $60,000 by the Cure Blau Syndrome Foundation (CBSF) for her research on Blau Syndrome, a rare pediatric disease that robs those affected of their vision, mobility and in some cases, their life. CBSF raised money for Huey’s research, naming her the foundation’s inaugural Blau Scholar. Read more here

January 2024

Dr. Bahareh Ajami has been selected as an inaugural awardee of the Tambourine ALS Breakthrough Research Fund. The goal for the ALS Breakthrough Research Fund is to accelerate innovative basic and discovery-focused ALS research by supporting scientific proposals that display creativity and tremendous potential for impact. Congratulations, Dr. Ajami! 

Fikadu Tafesse and Scotland Farley had their paper, "Trifunctional Sphinganine: A New Tool to Dissect Sphingolipid Function" published in ACS Chemical Biology. 

Bahareh Ajami’s proposal for the project Microglia regulation of selective neuronal vulnerability associated with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) has been approved by the Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at Johns Hopkins for one year.

Tyler Franklin, a postdoctoral scholar in Jonathan Pruneda’s lab, had his paper “Bacterial ligases reveal fundamental principles of polyubiquitin specificity“ published in Molecular Cell and chosen as the School of Medicine’s Paper of the Month. 

September 2023

Alexis Gibson, Ph.D., postdoctoral researcher at Oregon Health & Science University, is the recipient of a 2023 Howard Hughes Medical Institute, or HHMI, Hanna Gray Fellowship. The prestigious award recognizes talented early career scientists in the biomedical sciences.  Read more here
 

2022

We are excited to congratulate Dr. Tim Nice on his promotion to Associate Professor in MMI as of July 1, 2022.

We are excited to congratulate Dr. Fikadu Tafesse on his promotion to Associate Professor in MMI as of July 1, 2022.

We are excited to congratulate Dr. Jeff Nolz on his indefinite tenure as an Associate Professor in MMI.

Congratulations to Dr. Bahareh Ajami and the Ajami Lab on receiving the Alzheimer’s Association Research Grant for their project entitled: Microglia regulation of Alzheimer’s Disease pathology and progression.

Congratulations to the Rauch Lab on receiving new R01 grant funding from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for their project entitled: The role of the tuft cell inflammasome in infection.

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab on their recent publication in JAMA, entitled, “Antibody Response and Variant Cross-Neutralization After SARS-CoV-2 Breakthrough Infection”.

2021

2021 MMI Retreat Awards -

Best Question: 
Jacob Van Winkle (Doctoral Student in the lab of Tim Nice)

Best Graduate Student Poster was awarded to Tyler Franklin from the Pruneda Lab, "Mechanism of ubiquitin chain specificity in bacterial HECT-like E3 ligases"

Best Postdoctoral Poster was awarded toMahmoud Abdelbary from the Nolz Lab, "Core fucosylation of N-linked glycans contributes to phenotypic variations of memory CD8 T cell differentiation following acute viral infection"

Best Talk:   
Adam Filipowicz (Doctoral student in lab of Alejandro Aballay), “Neuronal and molecular mechanisms for pathogen avoidance in C. elegans”

Sears Fellowship Award:     
Zoe Lyski (Doctoral Student in lab of William Messer), “SARS-CoV-2 specific memory B-cells from subjects with diverse disease severities recognize variant of concern receptor binding domains”

Congratulations to the Ajami Lab for receiving a Michael J. Fox Foundation grant to investigate the influence of genetic risk factors of Parkinson's disease on immune cells to help identify what may lead to disease manifestation. 

Congratulations to Dr. Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab! They just received funding from the MJ Murdock Charitable Trust's Commercialization Grant on their project, entitled, "Spike Nanobodies as Therapeutics Against SARS-CoV-2 and Emerging Coronaviruses.”

Congratulations to the Landfear Lab on their recent publication ACS, entitled. "Amino-Substituted 3-Aryl- and 3-Heteroarylquinolines as Potential Antileishmanial Agents."

Congratulations to the Tafesse Lab and Messer Lab on their recent publication at JAMA, entitled, “Age-Dependent Neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 and P.1 Variant by Vaccine Immune Serum Samples."

We are excited to congratulate Dr. Georgiana Purdy on her promotion to full Professor in MMI as of July 1, 2021.

We are excited to congratulate Dr. Bill Messer on his promotion to Associate Professor in MMI as of July 1, 2021.

Congratulations to Dr. Jonathan Pruneda and the Pruneda Lab! They just received funding on an R35 MIRA grant from NIGMS on their project, entitled: “Exploiting bacterial effector proteins to study human ubiquitin signaling”

Congratulations to the Nolz & Messer lab on their new publication in the Journal of Immunology, entitle, "Cellular and Humoral Immune Responses in Mice Immunized with Vaccinia Virus Expressing the SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein".

Congratulations to Dr. Ruth Napier on her project, entitled, “Understanding how the CARD9-neutrophil-Th17 axis controls ankylosing spondylitis” for being funded by the Arthritis National Research Foundation.

Congratulations to the Messer Lab and the Tafesse Lab on their recent publication in MedRxiv, entitled, “Neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 variants by convalescent and vaccinated serum."

Congratulations to Dr. Alejandro Aballay and the Aballay lab on their new publication in PLOS Biology, entitled, “Microbial colonization induces histone acetylation critical for inherited gut-germline-neural signaling.”

Congratulations to Cam Roberts from the Pruneda Lab for being awarded Honorable Mention by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program!

Congratulations to Alina Krollenbrock and the Riscoe lab on the publication of their new paper in ACS Infectious Diseases, entitles, “Robenidine Analogues Are Potent Antimalarials in Drug-Resistant Plasmodium falciparum”.

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab on receiving a new grant award for their project titled: “Novel strategies to increase CD8 T cell migration into lymphoid follicles to augment ART-mediated HIV eradication.”

Congratulations to Dr. David Johnson and the Johnson Lab! They have received new grant funding for their project, entitled, “Human Cytomegalovirus Entry into Cells Mediated by Pentamer and Trimer Complexes.”

Congratulations Dr. Mike Munks on receiving grant funding from Roche Glycart AG for a project, entitled, “Analysis of biological activity and anti-tumor efficacy of tumor targeted soluble MHC peptide complexes in immunocompetent mice.”

Congratulations to Dr. Eric Barklis and the Barklis Lab! They just received grant funding for their project, entitled, “Novel probes to target ras cancers.”

Congratulations to Dr. Ruth Napier and Dr. Holly Rosenzweig’s labs on the publication of their new paper, “T cell–intrinsic role for Nod2 in protection against Th17-mediated uveitis” in Nature Communications.

We have some exciting news from the Johnson Lab related to COVID-19 testing. They are collaborating with a lab at VGTI and Donna Hansel in the COVID testing laboratory to get testing of COVID antibodies going across the state of Oregon.

Congratulations Dr. Mike Munks on receiving grant funding from the Brenden-Colson Center for your project, entitled, “Efficacy of a cytomegalovirus-vectored cancer vaccine, targeting TROP-2, in a mouse model of pancreatic cancer.”

Congratulations to Dr. Jeff Nolz and the Nolz lab on receiving a new grant award for their project titled: “Mechanisms of resident memory T cell differentiation controlled by antigen recognition in non-lymphoid tissue.”

Congratulations to Dr. David Johnson and the Johnson Lab on receiving new grant funding from the OHSU Foundation for their project, entitled, “To support research in developing proteins to be used for COVID-19 antibody testing.”

Congratulations to Dr. Bill Messer and the Messer Lab on receiving a new R01 grant, entitled, "A prospective cohort study to assess longitudinal immune responses in hospitalized patients with Codiv-19.”

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab on receiving a new grant award for their project titled: “SARS-CoV-2 nanobodies as therapeutics against COVID-19.”

Congratulations to Dr. Jeff Nolz and the Nolz lab. They received a new R01 grant award for their project, entitled, “Regulation of memory T cell trafficking by core 2 O-glycan synthesis.”

Congratulations to Dr. Georgiana Purdy and the Purdy lab on receiving a new R21 grant entitled: “The role and fate of Mtb storage lipids LCTAG and MWE.”

Congratulations to David Constant, Ph.D., of the Nice Lab for having his MRF Early Clinical Investigator Grant awarded.

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab on the American Lung Association Innovation Award for your project titled: “Defining the roles of diacylglycerol in Mtb infection using multi-functional chemical probes.”

We have some exciting news from the Johnson Lab related to COVID-19 testing. They are collaborating with a lab at VGTI and Donna Hansel in the COVID testing laboratory to get testing of COVID antibodies going across the state of Oregon.

Congratulations to Dr. Bella Rauch and the Rauch Lab! They just received an award for their project "Mechanisms of inflammasome induced epithelial cell extrusion" from the Collins Medical Trust.

Congratulations to Dr. Bahareh Ajami and the Ajami Lab! They just received a new grant award for their project, entitled, "Advanced Single Cell Proteogenomic Approaches to Studying microglial heterogeneity in Alzheimer’s Disease" from the Collins Medical Trust. 

Congratulations to Dr. Jeff Nolz and the Nolz lab! They just received an R01 Supplement for COVID-19 Research from NIAID for their project entitled “Immunogenicity of Vaccinia virus vectors expressing modified versions of the SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein as a vaccine candidate”.

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse and the Tafesse Lab! Their project, titled, SARS-CoV-2 Nanobodies as Therapeutics Against COVID-19, was just funded by the Biomedical Innovation Program (BIP) COVID-19 Rapid Response.

Congratulations to the Lind Lab on their new publication entitled “Reversible suppression of T cell function in the bone marrow microenvironment of acute myeloid leukemia.” It was accepted in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Congratulations to Dr. Eric Barklis on getting a new MRF grant entitled “Analysis of HIV-1 Gag-Envelope Protein Interactions.”

Congratulations to Dr. Fikadu Tafesse on receiving a new R01 grant entitled “Determining the role of sphingolipids in Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection.”

We are very proud to announce that two MMI Professors, Scott Landfear and Mike Riscoe, have been elected to the American Academy of Microbiology - the honorific society of the American Society for Microbiology.  This is a richly deserved honor and celebrates Dr. Landfear’s work in the field of molecular parasitology, which he helped pioneer in the early 1980s. The award also recognizes Dr. Landfear’s extensive work on nutrient uptake pathways in Leishmania (as well as trypanosomes and Plasmodium), with particular emphasis on glucose and purines.   This prestigious honor recognizes Dr. Riscoe’s pioneering work with an innovative high-throughput screening approach to discover novel antimalarial drugs. The accolade also recognizes Professor Riscoe’s current work to establish the use of a compound not only as an antimalarial drug but also as a prophylactic therapeutic, which highlights the importance of his research for public health.

Congratulations to Dr. Bill Messer and the Messer Lab on receiving a new R01 grant entitled "Long term immunity following yellow fever vaccination.”

Congratulations to Iris Jones, awarded the NIH Individual Fellowship – F31 Grant!

Congratulations to Sam Hobbs for receiving a fundable score on his F31 NRSA Fellowship.

Congratulations to Jeff Nolz, Ph.D., on his promotion to associate professor! This career milestone is a testament to his accomplishments and to his trajectory in investigating the mechanisms of T cell trafficking, activation, function and differentiation.

Congratulations to Rosenzweig Lab! The lab has been awarded with NIH R01 funding, and Ruth Napier, Ph.D., has been awarded with the VA Career Development Award. 

SOM News: Leadership team selected for new Ph.D. Program in Biomedical Sciences.

Welcoming new faculty: Please join us in welcoming Bahareh Ajami, Ph.D., as an assistant professor, to the Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology and the Department of Behavioral Neuroscience. Dr. Ajami’s research is focused on advancing our understanding of the function and biology of the brain’s intrinsic immune cells: microglia. 

Dr. Ajami's previous work has established the fate and origin of microglia in the brain during health and disease. In her most recent work, by adopting a novel single-cell proteomics approach, CyTOF (mass cytometry), Dr. Ajami has demonstrated that microglia are a network of cells comprised of several subpopulations with distinct immune responses in different neurological disorders. This work has resulted in the discovery of a new therapeutic target for Multiple Sclerosis and ALS disease and has recently been licensed by a biotech company for further development. 

Drawing on her recent discovery of different microglia subsets combined with proteogenomics approaches and computational methods, Dr. Ajami’s research program will focus on understanding of microglia subset functional specialization and the mechanisms that control the functional identity of different subsets both in mice and humans. Her lab will examine how these regulations are changed in different neurodegenerative diseases such as ALD and AD, revealing their endowed capacity to induce distinct types of neurodegenerative diseases and designing novel strategies to target them for therapies.

Open position for an assistant professor: The Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, in collaboration with the Department of Behavioral Neuroscience, invites applications at the assistant professor level to work on the basic or translational aspects of neuroimmunology. See Research Opportunities for details.

A new recruitment has been opened for the Dean’s Research Scholar Program.  Applications are due by November 25, 2018. Find details on the program and application requirements.

Congratulations to Ruth Napier, Ph.D., for getting awarded a Medical Research Foundation Grant for her project Investigation of NOD2 as a T cell intrinsic regulator of rheumatoid arthritis.

SOM News: Paths to Leadership and faculty development.

SOM News: Dr. Georgiana Purdy appointed to NIH Bacterial Pathogenesis Study Section.

Congratulations to Tafesse lab. They've received a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for their research project, Nanobodies as a Targeted-Therapeutic Against Mtb. Read more.

Congratulations to Nolz Lab and Hill Lab. Their recently published article, Enzymatic synthesis of core 2 O-glycans governs the tissue-trafficking potential of memory CD8(+) T cells, has been recommended in F1000Prime for having special significance in its field.