Systems Biology Analysis of Cell State Transitions in Inflammation

The induction of an inflammatory response is an essential component of the response to infection and injury. In an optimal setting, inflammatory responses should persist for the duration of the infection or injury and then wane (or revert into a resting state) to avoid the deleterious effects of prolonged inflammation (tissue damage,neurodegeneration, etc.). The disease consequences of chronic inflammation are numerous and include heart disease, Alzheimer’s, and asthma.

This project has two overarching objectives:

• Develop and apply integrated experimental and computational methods to define and describe inflammatory macrophage phenotypic transitions following stimulation with alternative immunologic stimuli.
• Develop an integrated computational and experimental framework to nominate and test perturbations that can reverse stable macrophage phenotypes.