Leeana Peters joined the Brusko lab as a first-year undergraduate student and received a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellowship for the 2015-2016 academic year to investigate the CD226/TIGIT axis in regulatory T cells and potential cellular therapy applications. She is currently a third year PhD student interested in elucidating the role of T1D candidate genes such as PTPN22 and CD226 in disease progression, as well as utilizing bioinformatic approaches to identify novel cell subsets and biomarkers for T1D.
Funding
F31 1F31DK129004-01A1, Multi-modal single cell analysis for investigation of T1D pathogenesis (05/31/2022- 05/31/2024)
T32 DK108736-01A1, Trainee, Atkinson (PI). Single cell sequencing and immune profiling of NOD-CD226KO & human nPOD donor tissue (2022)
Awards and Professional Honors
Outstanding Abstract Award Winner. Title: Single cell transcriptomic and epigenetic analysis of pancreatic lymph node tissues in T1D. Immunology of Diabetes Society (IDS) (2021)
Medical Guild Advancement to Candidacy Award. Medical Guild Research Symposium (2021)
6th Annual Council of Academic Chairs Scholarship Recipient(2021)
Publications
- Brown ME, Peters LD, Hanbali SR, Arnoletti JM, Sachs LK, Nguyen KQ, Carpenter EB, Seay HR, Fuhrman CA, Posgai AL, Shapiro MR, and Brusko TM (2022) Human CD4+CD25+CD226– Tregs Demonstrate Increased Purity, Lineage Stability, and Suppressive Capacity Versus CD4+CD25+CD127lo/- Tregs for Adoptive Cell Therapy. Front. Immunol. 13:873560. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2022.873560
- Li W, Gong M, Park YP, Elshikha AS, Choi SC, Brown J, Kanda N, Yeh WI, Peters L, Titov AA, Teng X, Brusko TM, Morel L. Lupus susceptibility gene Esrrg modulates regulatory T cells through mitochondrial metabolism. JCI Insight. 2021 Jul 22;6(14):e143540. doi: 10.1172/jci.insight.143540. PMID: 34156979; PMCID: PMC8410062.
- Perry DJ, Peters LD, Lakshmi PS, Zhang L, Han Z, Wasserfall CH, Mathews CE, Atkinson MA, Brusko TM. Overexpression of the PTPN22 Autoimmune Risk Variant LYP-620W Fails to Restrain Human CD4+ T Cell Activation. J Immunol. 2021 Aug 1;207(3):849-859. doi: 10.4049/jimmunol.2000708. Epub 2021 Jul 23. PMID: 34301848; PMCID: PMC8323970.
- Shapiro MR, Thirawatananond P, Peters L, Sharp RC, Ogundare S, Posgai AL, Perry DJ, Brusko TM. De-coding genetic risk variants in type 1 diabetes. Immunol Cell Biol. 2021 Jan 22. doi: 10.1111/imcb.12438. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33483996
- L.D. Peters. A.L. Posgai. T.M. Brusko. June 2020. 1663-P: Gene Editing of the Human T-Cell Receptor Locus Enables Optimized In Vitro Testing of Autoreactive T-Cell Function in Type 1 Diabetes. American Diabetes Association. (69). https://doi.org/10.2337/db20-1663-P. Poster Presentation.
- Dean, Joseph W; Peters, Leeana D; Fuhrman, Christopher A; Seay, Howard R; Posgai, Amanda L; Stimpson, Scott E; Brusko, Maigan A; Perry, Daniel J; Yeh, Wen-I; Newby, Brittney N; Haller, Michael J; Muir, Andrew B; Atkinson, Mark A; Mathews, Clayton E; Brusko, Todd M. (2020) Innate inflammation drives NK cell activation to impair Treg activity. Journal of autoimmunity. 108 :102417
- Motwani, K., Peters, L. D., Vliegen, W. H., El-Sayed, A. G., Seay, H. R., Lopez, M. C., … Brusko, T. M. (2020). Human Regulatory T Cells From Umbilical Cord Blood Display Increased Repertoire Diversity and Lineage Stability Relative to Adult Peripheral Blood. Frontiers in Immunology, 11. DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2020.00611
- L. Peters, A. Posgai, T. M. Brusko. (2019). Islet–immune interactions in type 1 diabetes: the nexus of beta cell destruction. Clinical & Experimental Immunology. 198(3). https://doi.org/10.1111/cei.13349
- Seay HR, Putnam AL, Cserny J, Posgai AL, Rosenau EH, Wingard JR, Girard KF, Kraus M, Lares AP, Brown HL, Brown KS, Balavage KT, Peters LD, Bushdorf AN, Atkinson MA, Bluestone JA, Haller MJ, Brusko TM. Expansion of Human Tregs from Cryopreserved Umbilical Cord Blood for GMP-Compliant Autologous Adoptive Cell Transfer Therapy. Mol Ther Methods Clin Dev. 2016 Dec 24;4:178-191. doi: 10.1016/j.omtm.2016.12.003. eCollection 2017 Mar 17. PubMed PMID: 28345003; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC5363324