Susanne Brix Pedersen
Professor
Department of Biotechnology and Biomedicine
MBT-g-Disease-Systems-Immunology
Bygningstorvet
Building 116B Room 121C
2800 Kongens Lyngby
Danmark
The research focuses on host-microbiota interactions in life-style mediated diseases, with particular focus on allergy, asthma, inflammatory bowel diseases, obesity-related disorders and functional somatic disorders. In this regard, we have specific interest in early-in-life programming of immune function towards later disease trajectories, in mechanisms controlling immune regulation at barrier sites such as the gut and lungs, and in the gut-brain axis. We continuously expand and use high-throughput single-cell technologies, high sensitivity antibody-based assays and proteomics to define functional immune cell subsets, signaling molecules and biomarkers in tissues, mucosal secretions and blood from clinical studies in children and adults, and in experimental model systems. We examine host factors of importance for host-microbe interactions by use of co-culture models of microbes with primary epithelial and immune cells and develop bioinformatics-based tools to decipher the type of microbial immunoregulatory metabolites and compounds in human metagenomic samples from the intestine and airway compartments. The work is centered on systems wide analysis, and the group has made recent major achievements regarding microbiome-immune interactions in relation to programming of different asthma disease endotypes during childhood. Research keywords: Diet, gut and lung microbiomes (abundance and function), sequencing of Ig-coated bacteria to identify disease-driving microbes, profiling of immune cell heterogeneity and functionality in tissues, inflammatory responses, immune regulation (in vivo and experimental systems), early life programming and lifestyle-associated diseases.