Helminths are parasitic worms that are endemic across many tropical and developing countries. Globally it is estimated that over 1.45 billion people are infected with helminths in any year. Hookworms are a group of helminths that cause significant morbidity due to the infectious route they employ. After penetrating through the skin, hookworms travel to the lung where they cause massive damage and haemorrhage before being swallowed into the gut where they mate and produce eggs. People who live in areas where they are regularly infected build immunity over time.
My research is trying to understand how the immune system recognises the worms, traps and then kills them before they can cause damage. Using a mouse model of hookworm infection, our lab has shown that the worms are killed in the lungs of mice that are immune to infection. I have been focusing on how the cells of the lung respond to the hookworm invasion. Non-immune cells in the lung respond to the damage caused by infection by producing signals that alarm the immune system. We have shown that some of these signals are sufficient to prepare the immune system so it can effectively deal with the hookworm infection. Using genetically modified mice which have immune cells that glow different colours depending on how they are responding to the infection, we have identified several key immune cells in the lung that play vital roles in orchestrating and maintaining the anti-hookworm immune response.
This work adds to the understanding of how the cells of the immune system react and collaborate to destroy invading helminths and could aid in development of effective anti-helminth vaccines.