The UB community is invited to join us on Monday, September 23rd for a GEM Work-in-Progress science talk presented by Ryan Hunter, PhD, Associate Professor in the UB Department of Microbiology and Immunology.

Title: When good bugs go wild: How commensal microbiota shape chronic airway disease trajectories

Persistent airway infections in individuals with cystic fibrosis, sinusitis, and COPD, are composed of complex microbial communities whose interactions with one another and the host are primary drivers of disease morbidity. In addition to canonical pathogens such as Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, our culture independent data show that oral-associated microbes (e.g. Prevotella, Veillonella, Fusobacterium) are also both prevalent and abundant during chronic airway infection, raising the question of what role these taxa play in disease progression. This seminar will highlight both detrimental and potentially beneficial roles of oral-derived microbiota in shaping chronic airway disease trajectories and therapeutic efficacy, and how we may exploit bacterial-bacterial interactions to improve patient outcomes.

To foster cross-disciplinary conversations about ongoing GEM-related research, the GEM Community hosts monthly Work-in-Progress talks during the UB fall & spring semesters. These informal science talks take place at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, located on UB's Downtown Campus. The speaker schedule is available on the GEM website: www.buffalo.edu/gem.

We are actively seeking UB faculty, post-doc and student speakers for our GEM Work-In-Progress series! If you would like to present your work at a GEM Work-in-Progress session, please contact Sara Thomas at msthomas@buffalo.edu.

Sara Thomas
Email: msthomas@buffalo.edu