Cardiopulmonary Transplantation & Immunology

The main focus of our research is to understand the molecular and cellular mechanisms of lung injury relevant to lung transplantation and particularly to chronic allograft rejection, or bronchiolitis obliterans (BO). Along this avenue we are focusing on adenosine signaling, both endogenous adenosine and use of adenosine agonists as therapeutic treatments, in cardiothoracic transplantation. We use multiple models to investigate our aims including the murine heterotopic and orthotopic tracheal transplant models for chronic lung transplant rejection, the orthotopic heart transplant model, and the left lung hilar clamp model for lung ischemia-reperfusion injury. Another area of research we are actively investigating is mechanisms of lung tumor invasiveness.

More information on our transplant & immunology research can be found by visiting our Transplant & Immunology website.