Description
Title: "Brain-eating amoebas…do we stand a chance? The immune response to Naegleria fowleri ”
Speaker: 
E. Ashley Moseman, PhD
Assistant Professor of Immunology
Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
Abstract:
Naegleria fowleri, or the “brain-eating amoeba,” is a free-living amoeba found in warm fresh water throughout the world. N. fowleri contact with the upper airway can cause a highly lethal infection known as primary amoebic meningoencephalitis (PAM), for which there is no effective therapy. Upper airway
and brain invasion by N. fowleri provokes an intense immune response, but this response ultimately fails to control the parasite and contributes to severe immunopathology. In vitro studies have suggested anti- amoebic roles for many host immune mechanisms, but how these in vitro findings relate to in vivo
disease pathogenesis is unclear. We are defining immune mechanisms that are critical -or dispensable-
for in vivo anti-amoebic immune activity and ave found evidence for several non-redundant and dispensable innate immune functions. Additionally, our lab has generated monoclonal antibodies that bind the amoebic cell surface and not only interfere with amoeba growth but can target amoeba for immune mediated destruction. Antibody isotypes contain unique fragment crystallizable (Fc) regions with distinct effector functions. By generating antibody isotype variants, we are able to specifically target protective innate effector functions to the amoeba. Our ultimate goal is to use our understanding of the in vivo immune response to N. fowleri to balance protective and pathologic immune activity to improve clinical outcomes for PAM.
Bio:
While Ashley was born in North Carolina, he grew up in the Midwest- spending his formative
years in Indiana. His love of Immunology was instilled while earning his BA from Carleton
College, Northfield, MN in 2002. He received his PhD in immunology from Harvard in 2011. As a
graduate student in Uli von Andrian’s lab, he identified mechanisms by which lymph node
resident subcapsular sinus macrophages are specialized to facilitate both innate and adaptive
antiviral responses. His soft spot for lymph nodes has never waned. As a postdoc in
Dorian McGavern’s lab at the NINDS, NIH, he addressed the long-standing observation that many
non-cytopathic viruses fail to generate robust neutralizing antibody responses,
demonstrating that IFN-I signaling drives CD8 T cells to engage and kill virally infected LCMV-
glycoprotein specific B cells shortly after infection. While in the McGavern lab, by observing in
vivo interactions he was able to show that T cells interact with microglia to prevent regulate non-
cytolytic viral clearance during central nervous system (CNS) infection via the olfactory route.
This project was the impetus for the current lab focus on host-pathogen interactions at the
olfactory barrier. We are interested in how the olfactory barrier coordinates innate and adaptive
immunity to prevent CNS infections, and how these defenses fail. Outside of lab, Ashley enjoys
all sorts of gardening and recently installed a small apple orchard in his backyard. He can be a
colorful character, as his tendency toward making and wearing tie dye would suggest. While a
fan of almost all college sports, he is a very serious Indiana University basketball & soccer fan
Date: Monday, March 27, 2023
Time: 12-1 pm
Location: Hill 132 or Virtually Via Zoom
Questions? Please contact Michael Black if you have questions.