Sladjana Prisic, PhD

Tuberculosis (TB) claims over 1 million lives every year. TB was the deadliest infectious disease until 2020, when it was dethroned by COVID-19. The ongoing pandemic has a detrimental effect on global efforts to control TB. Alternative approaches are needed for treating TB, as the current treatment regimens are long and complex, and will not be sufficient to eradicate TB. In addition, the increase in drug resistance is making the discovery of new TB treatments even more pressing. We will study whether the low zinc environment found in infected tissues triggers adaptive changes in the bacterium that causes TB. These changes allow bacteria to be more efficiently engulfed by immune cells called macrophages and to interfere with the immune response to the infection. Identification of the responses triggered by the bacteria found in the low-zinc environment will allow for discovery of new drug targets to improve TB therapy.