Basic & Translational Research

Analysis of healthy and diseased lung tissue provides a rich and critical resource for understanding the causes of inflammation and scar formation in ILD.

Dr. Tushar Desai is a leader in the fields of lung stem cell biology, lung injury and repair, and diseases of the gas exchange region. He is a member of the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine and his lab employs a variety of cutting-edge techniques to study IPF and other lung diseases, including lung slice cultures and stem cell organoid cultures.

Dr. Desai’s lab has co-developed powerful multiplexed staining technologies for use in human lung tissue. These staining tools complement sophisticated genomic studies of healthy and diseased human lungs and the insights they yield provide the foundation for identifying new and effective treatments for IPF and other fatal lung diseases. Several pulmonary physician scientists are researching different aspects of IPF under Dr. Desai’s guidance.

Dr. Tushar Desai (right) and Dr. Rishi Raj (left)

Our group works closely with our ILD, rheumatology, medical transplant, and surgical transplant colleagues to identify the causes of and potential treatments for ILDs. We collect patient lung and skin tissue samples that are grown in culture and analyzed using advanced research techniques to decipher in which cells the disease originates. These studies shed light on potential treatments to control the abnormal cells that can help halt the disease process and prevent further lung damage. Our group is also interested in the potential role of diseased lung stem cells in causing ILD and the possibility of transplanting healthy stem cells into the lung as a treatment for IPF

- Tushar Desai, MD

Other Investigators

Nicholas Juul, MD and Jung-Ki Yoon, MD are investigating the Wnt signaling pathway, which is overactive in IPF, using patient lung slice cultures and organoid cultures to test if blocking different combinations of receptors for the Wnt pathway in IPF lung can prevent new fibrosis from developing.

Matthew McCarra, MD is investigating the role of a process called ’senescence’ in IPF using patient-derived lung stem cell organoids, and also studying the role of shortened telomere length and dysfunction of a gene called TERT in driving IPF. Dr. McCarra is also investigating whether purified mouse lung stem cells can be transplanted into the lungs of other mice in significant numbers, in order to work towards developing human lung stem cell transplantation as a potential future treatment for IPF.

Basic Science Publications

2022

Vaidyanathan S, Baik R, Chen L, Bravo DT, Suarez CJ, Abazari SM, Salahudeen AA, Dudek AM, Teran CA, Davis TH, Lee CM, Bao G, Randell SH, Artandi SE, Wine JJ, Kuo CJ, Desai TJ, Nayak JV, Sellers ZM, Porteus MH. Targeted replacement of full-length CFTR in human airway stem cells by CRISPR/Cas9 for pan-mutation correction in the endogenous locus. Mol Ther. 2022 Jan 5;30(1).

2021

Vaidyanathan S, McCarra M, Desai TJ. Lung stem cells and cystic fibrosis therapy. European Respiratory Society Monograph on Lung Stem Cells. 2021

Decaris ML, Schaub JR, Chen C, Cha J, Lee GG, Rexhepaj M, Ho SS, Rao V, Marlow MM, Kotak P, Budi EH, Hooi L, Wu J, Fridlib M, Martin SP, Huang S, Chen M, Muñoz M, Hom TF, Wolters PJ, Desai TJ, Rock F, Leftheris K, Morgans DJ, Lepist EI, Andre P, Lefebvre EA, Turner SM. Dual inhibition of αvβ6 and αvβ1 reduces fibrogenesis in lung tissue explants from patients with IPF. Respir Res. 2021 Oct 19;22(1)

Guenthart BA, Krishnan A, Alassar A, Madhok J, Kakol M, Miller S, Cole SP, Rao VK, Acero NM, Hill CC, Cheung C, Jackson EC, Feinstein I, Tsai AH, Mooney JJ, Pham T, Elliott IA, Liou DZ, La Francesca S, Shudo Y, Hiesinger W, MacArthur JW, Brar N, Berry GJ, McCarra MB, Desai TJ, Dhillon GS, Woo YJ. First lung and kidney multi-organ transplant following COVID-19 Infection. J Heart Lung Transplant. 2021 Aug;40(8)

2020

Salahudeen A, Choi S… Blish C, Desai TJ, Kuo CJ. Progenitor identification and SARS CoV-2 infection in long-term human distal lung organoid cultures. Nature 2020 Nov 25.

Juul NH, Stockman CA, Desai TJ. Niche cells and signals that regulate lung alveolar stem cells in vivo. Cold Spring Harb. Perspect. Biol. 2020 Apr29:a035717.

Nagendran M, Andruska AM, Harbury PB, Desai TJ. Advances in proximity ligation in situ hybridization (PLISH). Bio-Protocol 2020 10(21): e3808.

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Basic & Translational Research

Analysis of healthy and diseased lung tissue provides a rich and critical resource for understanding the causes of inflammation and scar formation in ILD.