Nguyen/Clancy Laboratory

Clancy Lab

Research interests in fungal pathogenesis, antifunga l drug resistance, infections among transplant recipients and carbapenem-resistant Klebsie/Jo pneumonioe. Dr. Clancy‘s lab is funded by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and National Institutes of Health (NIH) to investigate the roles of a novel Candido olbicons phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate-septin cell wall integrity pathway in pathogenesis and echinocandin drug resistance, molecular mechanisms of echinocandin resistance among Candido species, lung microbiome and cytokine signatures of bacterial pneumonia following lung transplantation, and evolution of antimicrobial resistance among Klebsiella pneumoniae carbapenemase (KPC)producing K. pneumonioe (Kp). Their work on KPC-Kp has been conducted in partnership with Dr. Hong Nguyen, who is Director of the UPMC Transplant Infectious Diseases and Antimicrobial Management Programs.

Nguyen Lab

Dr. Nguyen‘s longstanding research interests are in antifunga l drug resistance, fungal diagnostics, molecular pathogenesis of Candida infections, and infections in transplant recipient s. More recently, her lab has studied infections due to Klebsiello pneumonioe ca rbapenemase (KPC)-producing K. pneumonioe (Kp), which are the most pressing challenge for our TIO and AMP programs. Dr. Nguyen established the XOR Pathogen Laboratory, which is funded by UPMC to understand molecular resistance mechanisms in extensively drug resistant (XOR) bacteria recovered from our patients, and to develop effective antimicrobial treatment regimens against infections by these pathogens. She has collaborated closely with Dr. Clancy in a series of studies on the molecular genetics of KPC-Kp from our center. They have co-authored papers that establish a link between porin gene expression and KPC-Kp responses to carbapenems and colistin, identify and validate KPC-Kp ompK36 porin mutations as markers for resistance to carbapenems and colistin in vitro and in patients, and describe the molecular epidemiology and clinical manifestations of KPC-Kp bacteremia among transplant patients.

In the past three years, Dr. Nguyen and Dr. Clancy have cared for several patients at UPMC with KPC-Kp infect ions that developed resistance to ceftazidime-avibactam.