"Biomimetic Probes of the Host–Microbe Interface"

Microbes can foster human health or cause disease. How humans maintain a functional microbiome while avoiding the propagation of pathogenic microbes is unknown. We do know that the human-microbial interface is rich in glycans— from the carbohydrate coats of microbes to our mucins. Our goal is to understand how this carbohydrate language is built and read. This seminar will focus on elucidating carbohydrate-protein interactions and how they can be exploited to control microbes. Our findings can result in new strategies to combat pathogens, rapid methods to characterize microbial communities, and methods to regulate microbiome composition to promote human health.