Dr. Sandra Halonen Ph.D
Assistant Professor
: Microbiology Department
Office: 304A Cooley
Lab:
306 & 308 Cooley
Phone: 406-994-5351
email: shalonen@montana.edu
Course links:
2008 Courses:
Parasitology (MB 441)
Natural History of Infectious Disease (MEDS 531)
CV.pdf
OVERVIEW OF MY WORK:
I am interested in intracellular parasitism and the host-parasite interactions that underlie this symbiotic relationship. My work involves the obligate intracellular protozoan parasites Toxoplasma gondii and Neospora canium. Both of these parasites invade the central nervous system and my work concerns the biology of these parasites in the central nervous system. T. gondii can be acquired congenitally and causes severe neurological complications in the fetus and newborns and is a major opportunistic infection in the central nervous system in immunosuppressed patients. N. canium is a related and only recently described parasite which is carried by canids and can similarly can be acquired congenitally causing severe neurological complications. My research studies the interactions of T. gondii and N.canium with their host cells (neurons, astrocytes and microglia) in the central nervous system and the immune response in the brain to these parasites.
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Toxoplasma gondii in human neuron in culture
MY RESEARCH:
My research involves the study of the host parasite relationships between the obligate intracellular parasites, Toxoplasma gondii and Neospora canium in the central nervous system. We are currently studying the role of astrocytes as an important immune effector cell in the brain against T. gondii and using microarray analysis to define the IFN response genes in astrocytes and to help elucidate the role(s) of the recently identified IFNg response genes, IGTP and other members of the p47 family in the immune response against T. gondii. We are also studying the cyst stages of T. gondii and N. canium in the brain to elucidate an understanding of the basic biology of cystogenesis in astrocytes and neurons and to elucidate the basic mechanisms governing the long lived nature of this cyst stage in the central nervous system. These basic studies in the neuroimmunology of T.gondii and N. canium may lead to improved therapeutic interventions for these prevalent parasites.
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