Yasmine Belkaid

Following graduate school, she moved to the United States for a postdoctoral fellowship at NIAID's Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases. In 2002, she joined the faculty of the Division of Molecular Immunology in Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center before returning to NIAID in 2005 as a tenure-track investigator in the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases. In 2008, she became adjunct Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.[3]

Belkaid's research focuses on untangling the mechanisms underlying host-microbe interactions in the gastrointestinal tract and on the skin, which are natural barrier sites between the host's inner workings and their external environment.[4] This also includes the role microbiota play in promoting immunity against infection against other harmful pathogens.[5][4] Her group has contributed to the scientific understanding of how the host immune system can distinguish good microbes from the bad.[6][7]

Belkaid's research also led to the discovery of certain skin microbes that play an important role in immune defense.[7] They carried out this experiment using mice that had no naturally-occurring microbes in their skin or gut so they could colonize those mice with only one strain of "good" bacteria. They then infected the colonized and bacteria-free mice with a parasite and found that those without the "good" bacteria were unable to fight back against the parasite, while those with the bacteria mounted an effective immune response.[7] Her team has also found that beneficial bacteria living on the surface of the skin can also accelerate wound healing in mice.[8] Belkaid's group also studies what happens when there are imbalances in our microbiome. Belkaid's research has advanced scientific understanding of how shifts in microbiota can contribute to disease, particularly chronic inflammatory diseases like Crohn's disease and Psoriasis.[9][10][11][12][13]