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Immunology

Biomedical Sciences Graduate Program

About

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Research in Immunology at UVA includes research spanning basic development and regulation of the immune system to clinical trials.  Areas of interest include molecular aspects of B and T lymphocyte development, innate immunity, regulation of immune response quality, lymphocyte trafficking, modulation of immunity to viruses and bacteria, tumor immunology and immunotherapy, allergic diseases, autoimmunity, neuroimmunology and immunological perturbations in cardiovascular disease.The Immunology Training Program consists of outstanding faculty, students and post-doctoral fellows performing cutting-edge research in a collaborative and collegial environment.  We provide students with an interdisciplinary training experience that emphasizes the breadth of immunology as well as cell and molecular biology.  The Training Program is funded in part by an NIH training grant in its 17th year, with 32 mentors providing cohesion and comprehensiveness.

The Program is integrated with and supported by the Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Cancer Biology (MIC), the Carter Immunology Center, and the Center for Immunity, Inflammation, and Regenerative Medicine.  It also provides access to many state-of the-art research support facilities.

The program provides a creative and vibrant training environment that prepares students for careers in immunology research and the delivery of new and innovative therapies to patients.

Faculty

Genetic approaches, cellular and molecular biology of intracellular pathogen infection

Understanding the Molecular Basis of Macular Degeneration in Order to Hasten the Eradication of Blindness

Engineering cancer-killing T cells to overcome obstacles in solid tumors

Innate immunity, Cell clearance, Inflammatory and autoimmune disease

Engineering programmable immunotherapies for solid tumors

Molecular mechanisms linking innate immune and insulin signaling to control cell growth and metabolism

Natural Killer Cells, Viral Immunity, Genetic basis of host resistance to viral infection, Tumor immunity, Immune cell regulation

Pathways to enhance T cell function in tumors.

Role of Arf family GTPases in vesicular transport and cytoskeleton assembly.<br> Cell Biology of bacterial pathogenesis. <br>The innate immune response to bacterial infection.

Computational Biology; Machine Learning; Statistical Modeling; Single Cell Biology; Spatial Biology; Liquid Biopsy

The maternal and infant microbiome in childhood growth and immunity

Cellular and molecular mechanisms of Neisserial pathogenesis

Contribution of the Inflammatory Microenvironment to Tumor Initiation, Progression and Metastasis; Molecular Mechanisms of Cancer Chemoprevention

Ion channels and Ca2+-signaling in inflammation, immunity and tissue homeostasis

Systems Immunology, Cancer Systems Biology, , Neonatal and Maternal Immunology

Immune mechanisms of pathogenic antibody production in allergy and autoimmunity

Innate immunity, chronic disease, host-parasite interactions, Toxoplasma gondii, proteomics

Novel Therapies for Treating and Preventing Ischemic Heart Disease

RNA-protein interactions in antiviral immunity and autoimmune diseases.

Exploring new therapeutics avenues to treat Multiple Sclerosis.

Blinding disease age-related macular degeneration, utilizing the tools of immunology, molecular biology, and engineering.

Immune regulation for HCV infection and chronic liver inflammation

Post Transcriptional Gene Regulation and the Molecular Biology of Human Retroviruses

Immune response to infectious disease in the CNS

Bacterial cell signaling, host-pathogen interactions, intestinal pathogens

Role of lipid oxidation products in inflammation and vascular immunology in atherosclerosis and diabetes

Immune Memory

Understanding How Immunological Pathways Contribute to Neurodegenerative, Neurodevelopmental, Mental and Behavior Disorders

Physiology & Biophysics

Pathology

Immune System Regulation of Cardiometabolic Disease

Mitochondrial regulation of innate immune and antiviral signaling

Bioanalytical tools for inflammatory disease

The Proctor Laboratory integrates systems biology with molecular, cellular, and systems neuroscience into a cutting-edge framework for investigation of multi-scale mechanisms of Alzheimer's disease risk, onset, and progression.

Delineate the physiological importance and structure-function relationship of ER-associated degradation in humans.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus Gene Expression; Human Endogenous Viruses; SARS-CoV-2 Protein Trafficking; Post-transcriptional Gene Regulation

Genetic basis of common human disease, including type 1 diabetes, diabetic complications, ischemic stroke, atherosclerosis

Anti-tumor immunity in brain tumors, Cancer Neuroscience

Influence of commensal microbes on immune homeostasis, anti-tumor immunity, and metastasis

Regulatory T Cell biology in Inflammatory and Autoimmune Diseases.

Gram-positive pathogenesis; type VII secretion; impact of secreted effectors on host-pathogen interactions and immune responses

Immune Responses in asthma, pulmonary fibrosis, and lung injury.

Lung injury, repair, and fibrosis; B cell immunology

Viral immunology, Cancer immunology, Aging, Mucosal Immunology

Prokaryotic immune systems, bacteriophage virology, programmed cell death, pore-forming proteins, evolution of immunity, cGAS-STING, protein engineering

B cell Analysis and Engineering

Iron metabolism and Immunometabolism in inflammation and autoimmune diseases

The immune response to common cold and allergens in health and disease.

Molecular Imaging; Cancer Immunology; Vaccines.

Bioinformatics methodology development; Epigenetics and chromatin biology; Transcriptional regulation; Cancer genomics and epigenomics; Statistical methods for biomedical data integration; Advanced machine learning; Theoretical and computational biophysics

Unraveling the role of host microbe interactions in autoimmune diseases

Pathogenesis of infectious diseases and the development of new therapies and vaccines for infectious diseases and cancers.

Single Cell Analysis