In the News
View current news featuring the research, staff and advancements of the Hand Lab at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh’s Richard King Mellon Institute for Pediatric Research. Please check back often for continued updates.
Another Reason Breast Is Best for Fragile Preemie Babies
U.S. News & World Report (6/17/19)
Mother's Milk Protects Premature Babies Against Deadly Infection - But Only if it Contains a Special Antibody, Study Finds
Daily Mail (6/17/2019)
Breastmilk’s IgA Protects Preemies From Deadly Disease
Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News (6/18/2019)
HealthWatch: Breast Milk Helps Preterm Babies Fight Deadly Intestinal Disease
WJZ-13 CBS Baltimore (6/18/2019)
Natürlicher Schutz vor Gefürchtetem Darm-Notfall
Neue Zurcher Zeitung (6/22/2019)
Gli Anticorpi del Latte Materno che Proteggono i Bimbi Premature
Nostrofiglio (6/24/19)
Lab Activities and Achievements
2019
Abigail Overacre-Delgoffe, PhD, was honored with the Young Investigator Award from Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer.
Dr. Overacre-Delgoffe, was named Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation Post-doctoral Fellow.
Kathyayini Gopalakrishna, MBBS, and Dr. Overacre-Delgoffe won the Outstanding Poster and Oral Presentation at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh Research Day.
Dr. Gopalakrishna received a travel award from the Society for Mucosal Immunology to attend the International Congress of Mucosal Immunology in Brisbane, Australia.
Amrita Bhattacharjee, PhD, received the RAC Fellowship, UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.
Ansen Burr was named to the Autoimmunity and Immunopathology T32 Training Program.
Presentations at Scientific Meetings
2019
Timothy Hand, PhD, gave a Keynote presentation at the 8th Annual Meeting of the Graduate Program in Immunology, University of São Paulo, Brazil.
Dr. Gopalakrishna gave a Plenary Session presentation at the International Conference of Mucosal Immunology in Brisbane, Australia.
2018
Dr. Hand delivered the keynote address at the 2nd International Vaccines Against Shigella and Enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (VASE) Conference in Mexico City, Mexico.
T cells at mucosal surfaces are critical to protection against invasive bacteria, viruses and parasites. However, if intestinal T cells become dysregulated, they can contribute to autoinflammatory diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease. We study how T cells in the small intestine and colon are shaped by the microbiome, both to the benefit and detriment of the host. We are interested in how interaction with specific micro-organisms can shape T cells to assist in vaccination and tumor immunotherapy. Alternatively, we are interested in how intestinal bacteria can shift T cells into inflammatory states, contributing to disease.
The immune system has a key role in the shaping of the microbiota. Maintaining homeostasis with regard to the microbiota is a lifelong process and shaped by the development of immunological memory against the bacteria that make up the microbiota. Infants are quickly colonized with bacteria that they have had no previous experience with and are therefore susceptible to both ineffective (leading to infection) and exaggerated (leading to damaging inflammation) immune responses against the microbiota. We hypothesize that one of the functions of maternal milk is to shape the developing microbiome towards health and that the primary mediators of that effort are antibodies, particularly Immunoglobulin A, secreted into the breast milk. This work has implications for many pediatric diseases and perhaps most notably necrotizing enterocolitis, where we have shown that disease is associated with a failure of IgA to bind to the bacteria present in the preterm intestine.