Ariel Hernandez-Leyva
Program: Computational and Systems Biology
Current advisor: Andrew L. Kau, MD, PhD
Undergraduate university: Yale University
Research summary
I work in the laboratory of Dr. Andrew Kau studying the interactions between the gut microbiota and the airways of mammals. I have two primary lines of inquiry. First, I am interested in identifying the effect that the gut microbiota may have the immune response during allergic airway inflammation and asthma. To do this, we leverage a germ-free mouse model of asthma which we can colonize with patient microbiota collected as part of one of our two complete clinical studies on the association between asthma and the microbiome. Our investigations have thus far revealed an interesting relationship between the immune and epithelial response in the gut and the granulocytic response to allergic airway inflammation in the lung that we are currently preparing as a manuscript. My second line of inquiry, and going forward my thesis in the laboratory, investigates the influence the gut microbiota and its metabolic activities has on the profile of volatile organic compounds in mammalian breath. To explore this, our lab has developed and validated a method of collecting breath from mice colonized with various microbiota. So far, we have demonstrated that the gut microbiota has a definite effect on the profile of breath metabolites. We hope to develop a pipeline for the identification of breath biomarkers of interesting gut bacteria as well as determine what compounds produced by gut bacteria may have an influence on cells in the lungs.ounds produced by gut bacteria may have an influence on cells in the lungs.
Graduate publications
Hazan G, Eubanks A, Gierasch C, Atkinson J, Fox C, Hernandez-Leyva A, Rosen AL, Kau AL, Agapov E, Alexander-Brett J, Steinberg D, Kelley D, White M, Byers D, Wu K, Keeler SP, Zhang Y, Koenitzer JR, Eiden E, Anderson N, Holtzman MJ, Haspel J. 2022 Age-Dependent Reduction in Asthmatic Pathology through Reprogramming of Postviral Inflammatory Responses. J Immunol, 208(6):1467-1482.
Jaeger N, McDonough RT, Rosen AL, Hernandez-Leyva A, Wilson NG, Lint MA, Russler-Germain EV, Chai JN, Bacharier LB, Hsieh CS, Kau AL. 2020 Airway Microbiota-Host Interactions Regulate Secretory Leukocyte Protease Inhibitor Levels and Influence Allergic Airway Inflammation. Cell Rep, 33(5):108331.
Agarwal K, Robinson LS, Aggarwal S, Foster LR, Hernandez-Leyva A, Lin H, Tortelli BA, O’Brien VP, Miller L, Kau AL, Reno H, Gilbert NM, Lewis WG, Lewis AL. 2020 Glycan cross-feeding supports mutualism between Fusobacterium and the vaginal microbiota. PLoS Biol, 18(8):e3000788.
Gasparrini AJ, Wang B, Sun X, Kennedy EA, Hernandez-Leyva A, Ndao IM, Tarr PI, Warner BB, Dantas G. 2019 Persistent metagenomic signatures of early-life hospitalization and antibiotic treatment in the infant gut microbiota and resistome. Nat Microbiol, 4(12):2285-97.
Wilson NG, Hernandez-Leyva A, Kau AL. 2019 The ABCs of wheeze: Asthma and bacterial communities. PLoS Pathog, 15(4):e10076
Agarwal K, Robinson LS, Aggarwal S, Foster LR, Hernandez-Leyva A, Lin H, Tortelli BA, O’Brien VP, Miller L, Kau AL, Reno H, Gilbert NM, Lewis WG, Lewis AL. Glycan cross-feeding supports mutualism between Fusobacterium and the vaginal microbiota. PLoS Biol. 2020 Aug 25;18(8):e3000788.45.