Research

Meet our faculty members and learn more about their research...

At the Forefront of Lyme Disease Research

Stony Brook is ideally positioned to study Lyme disease. Not only is this disease most prevalent in our own area, but the first isolation of the spirochetal bacterium that causes Lyme disease, and the antibiotic regimen to combat it were done and developed here. Scientists at the Center for Infectious Diseases are studying how this microbe interacts with the blood and other tissues of the patient to learn more about the way it spreads in the body, and how it causes skin, heart, joints, and nervous system disease. The Center is also studying epidemiological and clinical features of Lyme and other local diseases carried by ticks and mosquitoes.

Fighting Diarrheal and Urinary Tract Infections

Diarrheal diseases, such as those caused by gram negative bacteria, are a huge problem worldwide. As contributors to childhood mortality, and joined with urinary tract infections, they can lead to chronic debilitating conditions. Scientists at the Center for Infectious Diseases are at the forefront in the study of how these intestinal and urinary tract microbes interact with their hosts to cause disease. Much of the initial work that demonstrated that there is crosstalk between these bacteria and the cells that they invade was done here at Stony Brook. We are continuing to find ways to further understand the complex relationship between bacteria and their host cells; and to design new treatments and ways to prevent the diseases altogether.

Understanding and Combating New Infections

The Center for Infectious Diseases will collaborate with clinicians to carry out epidemiological and clinical studies that could speed up the time that it takes for research discoveries to materialize into new therapeutics for the diagnosis and treatment of patients. Two emerging target areas of study are: to use the known genetics systems of bacteria to find new ways to outsmart them; and to explore the newly discovered relationships between infectious agents and diseases that were thought to be of uncertain origins.

Meet our faculty members and learn more about their research...