Affiliation: National Cancer Institute

Dr. Tiffany Zarrella is a PRAT fellow in the lab of Dr. Anupama Khare at the National Cancer Institute where she studies polymicrobial interactions between the co-infecting bacterial pathogens Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus, which often cause chronic, antibiotic resistant infections. She is elucidating the environmental conditions and molecular mechanisms that govern interbacterial communication and modulate antimicrobial production and resistance. Understanding these underlying molecular pathways in interspecies interactions will lead to the identification of novel targets for therapeutics that disrupt chronic bacterial infections. Dr. Zarrella earned her Ph.D. at Albany Medical College in the laboratory of Guangchun Bai where she researched the role of the bacterial signaling nucleotide cyclic di-AMP in controlling stress responses and competence in the pathogen Streptococcus pneumoniae.