Biomedical Sciences Graduate Program | University of California, San Francisco

My laboratory has three major interests. The first two focus on defining the biology of the host-parasite relationship for global parasitic infections like schistosomiasis and trypanosomiasis. We are studying mechanisms by which parasites invade host tissue, metabolize host proteins like hemoglobin, and regulate the expression of virulence factors during different stages of their life cycle. A tangent of this research is the development of specific inhibitors targeting proteases necessary for parasitic invasion and metabolism. We are also defining the host immune response to schistosome parasites that results in granuloma formation and fibrosis. One particularly intriguing discovery has been that schistosomes exploit the immune response as a signal for growth and egg production. Our third area of interest is the role of proteases in tumor progression. We are evaluating the expression of proteases in both mouse models of tumor development and in actual human tumor specimens. We then map structure-function relationships in tumor proteases with the goal of designing specific inhibitors as tools to probe the role of proteases in tumor progression, and as leads for future chemotherapy.