Martin Olivier, PhD

During the course of evolution, pathogens have developed different strategies to escape the host's innate and adaptive immune response. Over the last 10 years, studies performed in my laboratory have established, for instance, that protozoan parasites of the genus Leishmania can infect and survive the harsh environment of macrophages. To do so this parasite has the capacity to alter host signaling pathways to inhibit activation of a myriad of host microbicidal functions. We have shown that this process involves the activation of negative regulatory molecules such as phosphotyrosine phosphatases SHP-1. We are interested in furthering our understanding of the mechanisms driving this cellular process and in discovering other negative regulatory events. We are interested in determining whether such pathogen-mediated host signaling modulation has been conserved in evolution by other protozoan parasites such as those causing Trypanosomiasis and Malaria.Signaling, phosphotyrosine phosphatases, macrophage, interferon, transcription factor, malaria, leishmania, host-pathogen interaction, vaccine development, adjuvant