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Elisabet Bjånes

Postdoctoral Fellow

Research Interests

  • Nanoparticle vaccines
  • Biotherapeutics
  • Host-pathogen interactions

At the Bench

Elisabet is an east coast transplant, where she received her BS in Immunology & Infectious Disease from Penn State University and first fell in love with basic research after a two semester SEA-PHAGES program in collaboration with HHMI. Her undergraduate research characterized population evolution of clinical MRSA isolates using multi-virulence-locus-sequencing typing. Elisabet joined the Igor Brodsky lab at the University of Pennsylvania for her Ph.D. where she studied cell death pathways in response to Salmonella Typhimurium and Yersinia pseudotuberculosis infection. Currently, Elisabet develops nanoparticle vaccines against multidrug resistant pathogens in collaboration with the Liangfang Zhang lab and leads the industry partnerships with Cellics Therapeutics, VaxCyte Inc, Epic iO, and Micronbrane. 

Outside of Lab

Elisabet enjoys hiking seasonal waterfalls, baking and cooking, strategy board games, and hosting dinner parties. In her free time, she snuggles with her cats, plays Zelda, and cheers the Wave FC on.

Education

University Degree Year Field
University of California San Diego, La Jolla CA Postdoc 2020-present Microbiology, Vaccinology, Host-Pathogen Interactions
Phlebotomy USA, San Diego CA CPT-1 2023 Phlebotomy
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA Ph.D 2019 Cell and Molecular Biology
Pennsylvania State University, State College PA B.S. 2014 Immunology

 

Honors

Year Honor/Award
2023-present AP Giannini Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship
2022-2023 NIH/NHLBI T32 Training in the Nex Generation of Respiratory Science

Publications

Bjanes E, Zhou J, Qayum T, Krishnan N, Zurich RH, Menon ND, Hoffman A, Fang RH, Zhang L, Nizet L. Outer Membrane Vesicle-Coated Nanoparticle Vaccine Protects against Acinetobacter baumannii Pneumonia and Sepsis. Adv NanoBioMed Res. 2023. PMID: 37151210

McCabe S*, Bjanes E*, Hendriks A, Wang Z, van Sorge NM, Pill-Pepe L, Bautista L, Chu E, Codée JDC, Fiarman J, Kapoor N, Uchiyama S, Nizet V. The Group A Streptococcal Vaccine Candidate VAX-A1 Protects against Group B Streptococcus Infection via Cross-Reactive IgG Targeting Virulence Factor C5a Peptidase. Vaccines. 2023. PMID 38140215. *Co-first authorship

Bjånes E, Koh T, Qayum T, Zuric R, McCabe S, Hampel K, Cartwright L, Nizet V. Exploring roles of the polysaccharide capsule in pathogenesis of hypervirulent Acinetobacter baumannii clinical isolate Lac-4. Antibiotics. 2023. PMID: 38275320.

Bjanes E, Nizet V. More than a Pore: Nonlytic Antimicrobial Functions of Complement and Bacterial Strategies for Evasion. Microbiol Mol Biol Rev. 2021. 85(1):e00177-20. PMID: 33504655

Bjanes, E, Stream A, Gibson P, Bravo A, Dahesh S, Baker J, Varble A, Nizet V, Veening J-W. An efficient in vivo-inducible CRISPR interference system for group A Streptococcus genetic analysis and pathogenesis studies. mBio. Submitted.

Kumaraswamy M, Riestra A, Flores A, Dahesh S, Askarian F, Uchiyama S, Monk J, Bondsater G, Nilsson V, Chang M, Bulitta J, Lang Y, Kousha A, Bjånes E, Chavarria N, Clark T, Seo H, Sakoulas G, Nizet V. Unrecognized Potent Activities of Colistin Against Clinically Important mcr+ Enterobacteriaceae Revealed in Synergy with Host Immunity. JCI. Submitted.

Bjanes E, Garcia-Sillas R, Matsuda R, Fettrelet T, Demarco B, DeLaney A, Lopez EMR, Grubaugh D, Wynosky-Dolfi M, Tovar D, Joannas L, Beiting D, Schaefer B, Henao-Mejia J, Chen K, Broz P, Brodsky IE. Genetic targeting of Card19 is linked to disrupted Ninj1 expression, impaired cell lysis, and increased susceptibility to Yersinia infection. Plos Path 2021. PMID: 34648590 

Askarian F, Tsai CM, Cordara G, Zurich RH, Bjånes E, Golten O, … Nizet, V. Immunization with lytic polysaccharide monooxygenase CbpD induces protective immunity against Pseudomonas aeruginosa pneumonia. PNAS. 2023. PMID: 37459522

Barajas-Mora EM, Lee L, Lu H, Valderrama JA, Bjanes E, Nizet V, Feeney AJ, Hu M, Murre C. Enhancer-instructed chromatin folding and compartmentalization dictate Vκ repertoire rearrangement to combat bacterial infection. Nat Immun. 2022. PMID: 36717722

Hirose Y, Kolesinski P, Hiraoka M, Uchiyama S, Zurich R, Kumaraswamy M, Bjanes E. Ghosh P, Kawabata S, Nizet V. Contribution of Streptococcus pyogenes M87 protein to innate immune resistance and virulence. Micro Path 2022. PMID: 35724830

Holland M, Bjanes E, Nizet V, Dillon N. Bicarbonate modulates delafloxacin activity against multidrug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. JAC. 2021. PMID: 34893834

Demarco B, Grayczyk JP, Bjanes E, Le Roy D, Tonnus W, Assenmacher CA, Radaelli E, Fettrelet T, Mack V, Linkermann A, Roger T, Brodsky IE, Chen KW, Broz P. Caspase-8-dependent gasdermin D cleavage promotes antimicrobial defense but confers susceptibility to TNF-induced lethality. Sci Adv. 2020 6(47):eabc3465. PMID: 33208362

DeLaney AA, Berry CT, Christian DA, Hart A, Bjanes E, Wynosky-Dolfi MA, Li X, Tummers B, Udalova IA, Chen YH, Hershberg U, Freedman BD, Hunter CA, Brodsky IE. Caspase-8 promotes c-Rel-dependent inflammatory cytokine expression and resistance against Toxoplasma gondii. PNAS 2019 116(24):11926-11935. PMID: 31147458

Peterson LW, Philip NH, DeLaney A, Wynosky-Dolfi MA, Asklof K, Gray F, Choa R, Bjanes E, Buza EL, Hu B, Dillon CP, Green DR, Berger SB, Gough PJ, Bertin J, Brodsky IE. RIPK1-dependent apoptosis bypasses pathogen blockade of innate signaling to promote immune defense. J Exp Med. 2017 214(11):3171-3182. PMID: 28855241