Francqui Chair VUB 2020-2021: appointed to Maria-Luisa Alegre, University of Chicago

The laboratory of prof. Alegre is interested in T cell responses in settings of transplantation, autoimmunity and cancer, with an emphasis on mouse models and emerging extensions onto clinical translation. A main focus of the laboratory is on T cell tolerance in transplantation and how infections and inflammatory events can affect induction or maintenance of tolerance. They have found that transplantation tolerance can exist at different levels of robustness based on the number of mechanisms of T cell tolerance that are engaged, and that infections or inflammation can erode such tolerance. The impact of bacterial infections on transplant outcomes has led them to discover that the microbiota also influences immune responses to transplanted organs and can be manipulated to prolong graft survival. Their clinical studies have focused on the immunology of transplant recipients and of patients infected with the bacteria that influence transplant outcomes and, collaboratively, they have explored the involvement of the microbiota in the responsiveness of melanoma patients to immunotherapy.