Yoder-Himes Lab
Sidebar
About
The Yoder-Himes lab focuses on understanding how bacterial pathogens interact in natural environments, including the human lung. Identifying the molecular mechanisms that underlie these interactions can give us a better sense of how to combat diseases, develop new therapies and better predict disease progression.
Key Research Areas
- Understanding how the bacteria that infect the lungs of people with cystic fibrosis synergize, ignore, or combat each other
- Determine how environmental bacteria, such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, became human pathogens
- Explore novel means to combat antibiotic resistant pathogens without the use of antibiotics
- Educational research on software and classroom environments and how they affect students and student performance
Team
Deborah Yoder-Himes, Assoc. Professor
- Rasheda Banu, PhD student
- Hayden Skaggs, undergraduate researcher
- Audra Gogel, undergraduate researcher
- Marianna Rodriguez, undergraduate researcher
- Nadia Nasir, undergraduate researcher
- Gracie Vanderpool, undergraduate researcher
Our Work
- Identify the mechanism by which Burkholderia cenocepacia kills the major human pathogen, Staphylococcus aureus
- Conduct long term evolution experiments to determine whether soil bacteria can become pathogenic after evolution with a non-human predator
- Explore using photodynamic therapies to kill acute otitis media pathogens, such as Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae, and Moraxella catarrhalis
- Brandt TJ, Skaggs H, Hundley T, Yoder-Himes DR. 2024. Burkholderia cenocepacia-mediated inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus biofilm formation and maintenance. Journal of Bacteriology. In press.
- Cecil RE, Yoder-Himes DR. 2023. Examining the influence of environmental factors on Acanthamoeba castellanii and Pseudomonas aeruginosa in co-culture. PLoSONE. 19(6): e0305973. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0305973
- Beckerson WC, Anderson JO, Kulkarni S, Perpich J, Yoder-Himes DR. 2022. It’s About Time: Exploring the dose-dependent effects of active learning on students of different social personalities in an upper-level biology course. Journal of College Science Teaching. In press.
- Yoder-Himes DR, Asif A, Kinney K, Brandt TJ, Cecil RE, Himes PR., Cashon C, Hopp RMP, Ross E. 2022. Racial, skin tone, and sex disparities in automated proctoring software. Frontiers in Education. Vol 7. doi:10.3389/feduc.2022.881449.
Morgan SD, Yoder-Himes D, Jackson D, Naber J, Berry R, Cash E, Chandran S, Roussel T. Bactericidal effects of high-energy visible light on common otitis media pathogens. J Appl Microbiol. 2022 Mar;132(3):1856-1865. doi: 10.1111/jam.15366. Epub 2021 Nov 24. PMID: 34787955.
Yoder-Himes DR, Roux D, Schaefers MM, Clark BS, Weatherholt M, Thomas K, Renaud D, Priebe GP, Scott D, LiPuma JL, Gerard C. 2017. A Putative Lateral Flagella of the Cystic Fibrosis Pathogen Burkholderia dolosa Regulates Swimming Motility and Host Cytokine Production. PLoSONE. Jan 18;13(1):e0189810. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189810.