Tulane University has received a USD 1.09 million NIH R35 award from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to investigate CD4+ T cell immunity in the respiratory tract — research with direct implications for pneumonia vaccine and therapeutic development.
Pneumonia kills more children globally than any other infectious disease and ranks among the leading causes of adult mortality, yet mucosal immune protection in the lung remains incompletely understood. The award supports work by principal investigator Jay K. Kolls focused on tissue-resident memory CD4+ T cells (TRM cells) in the lung and nasal passages — a cell population that occupies a submucosal niche and depends on IL-17RC signaling in fibroblasts. The funded research will examine the metabolic requirements sustaining lung TRM cells, whether antigen re-exposure is needed for their long-term survival, and whether these cells epigenetically remodel local fibroblast populations. The bidirectional crosstalk between TRM cells and fibroblasts represents a mechanistically distinct angle on mucosal immunity that could inform next-generation mucosal vaccines designed to establish durable respiratory protection.
The R35 mechanism — NHLBI's Outstanding Investigator Award — is reserved for established researchers with demonstrated productivity, providing seven years of stable funding through May 2032. That long-horizon structure is suited to the biological questions here, where epigenetic reprogramming and metabolic adaptation in tissue-resident populations require longitudinal experimental approaches across murine and primate models.