Postdoctoral Associate Daniel J. Perry, Ph.D., was recently selected to speak at Immunology 2016.

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On Sunday, May 15, 2016, Postdoctoral Associate Daniel J. Perry, Ph.D., presented his research at Immunology 2016, the annual meeting of the American Association of Immunologists (AAI), at the Washington State Convention Center, in Seattle, Washington.

Dr. Perry was one of many highly qualified competition applicants, and he was selected by the SLB to be one of only four speakers for the event. Each speaker gave a 30-minute presentation on their research findings at the meeting and was awarded $750 to cover meeting travel and lodging expenses.

Researcher Mark A. Wallet, Ph.D., was also part of the event as a member of the Society for Leukocyte Biology (SLB) Professional Development Committee, where, along with his colleague, Mathew Delano, M.D., Ph.D., he co-chaired an SLB guest symposium at Immunology 2016, titled “Metabolic Regulation of Immunity.” Through the SLB, Dr. Wallet and other committee members held a society-wide competition only for junior investigators only (<10 years since terminal degree) to present at Immunology 2016.

A summary of Dr. Perry’s talk and the abstract for his presentation are below:

Metabolic profiling of human PBMC subsets

Energy requirements of immune cells are incredibly dynamic and tightly regulated, depending on whether they are actively responding to antigen or not. We have developed methods for assessing utilization of respiration and glycolysis by various human immune cell subsets. Using this technique, we have detected specific metabolic alterations in T cells unique to patients with type 1 diabetes and individuals with genetic risk for autoimmunity. The ultimate goal of this research is to develop these findings into an assay for biomarkers that are predictive of type 1 diabetes onset or progression, as well as to discover novel metabolic targets for disease intervention (i.e., prevention and/or cure).