Budzik Lab

Research focus

NIH R01 · 2025

Using proteomics to identify host cell death factors during M. tuberculosis infection

Abstract Infections from M. tuberculosis (Mtb) are a persistent global health threat. To develop therapies that augment protective host immune responses against Mtb and shorten TB treatment, this proposal seeks to test our central hypothesis that Mtb infection triggers autophagy factor phosphorylation that regulates host cell death mechanisms. Understanding these regulatory mechanisms will enable the development of new host cell death targets for Mtb treatment. In an unbiased phosphoproteomic analysis, we discovered Tax1bp1 (Tax1-binding protein 1) and Optineurin were significantly more phosphorylated in Mtb- versus mock-infected bone marrow- derived macrophages (BMDMs). Cytosolic autophagy…

From the public funding record at NIH RePORTER. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.