Inhalation & Infection Core (IIC)

INHALATION AND INFECTION CORE – PROJECT SUMMARY The new Inhalation and Infection Core (IIC) has been created to support the research need of the COBRE Promising Junior Investigators (PJIs) and NIH-funded investigators in their endeavors to study the combination of pulmonary infectious plus non-infectious agents within a single model and address mechanisms of respiratory diseases under real-life environmental exposure scenarios. The goal of the IIC is to provide expertise, assistance, and training, for the delivery of inhaled pollutants through novel exposure systems and to generate animal infection models. In addition, the IIC will offer physiologically relevant air-liquid interface in vitro models that closely mimic realistic pulmonary exposure conditions of inhaled toxicants and/or pathogens at the blood-air interface. The IIC builds upon our current bio-safety level 1 (BSL-1) inhalation research capability to expand into a BSL-2 area allowing inhalation exposures. Combining state-of-the-art capabilities for inhalation exposures to environmental pollutants with infectious disease models will create a multi-disciplinary platform, responsive to both current and future needs of JPIs, enabling investigators to conduct next level inhalation research and gain unique insight into mechanisms of toxicity of specific pathogens using real-life risk simulation approaches. The unique advantages offered by these infrastructural capabilities, which combine expertise for inhalation exposures and infection models, will position ourselves as a major center of expertise in the South. The IIC will provide experimental support via two specific aims. Aim 1. Create an all-inclusive BSL-2 research environment for inhalation studies. This will be accomplished A) by providing support and expertise to investigate interactions between human cells, pathogens, air pollutants and respiratory diseases, and B) by provide experimental expertise allowing for the performance of in vitro and in vivo assays using both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacterial species. Aim 2. Provide training to CLBD graduate students, post- doctoral fellows, and principal investigators on how to use the facilities and equipment provided by the IIC.