Biology subjects

Scherler, K.

Publications and source records attributed to Scherler, K..

4 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Multiomics Reveals Compartmentalized Immune Responses and Tissue-Vascular Signatures in Lyme Disease

Lyme disease (LD) is growing in incidence, with nearly 500,000 cases diagnosed annually in the United States. Despite treatment, some patients experience persistent symptoms. The immune mechanisms underlying LD remain poorly understood. We conducted a multiomic longitudinal analysis of 49 LD patients and matched controls, integrating plasma proteomics, metabolomics, PBMC immunophenotyping, and a meta-analysis of skin lesions. We identified compartmentalized immune responses in acute LD, with coordinated alterations in circulating plasma proteins and metabolites linked to endothelial barrier stability, metabolic reprogramming, and symptom severity, predominantly traced to tissue and vascular immune processes at the site of infection. In contrast, PBMCs remained largely quiescent, revealing a disconnect between localized tissue responses and systemic immunity. These findings provide novel insights into LD pathophysiology and highlight the potential for diagnostics leveraging tissue and vascular immune markers detectable in blood. They also provide a resource for biomarker discovery and predictive modeling to improve LD management.

immunology↗

bioRxiv2022

Engineering a Single Extracellular Vesicle Protein and RNA Assay (siEVPRA) via In Situ Fluorescence Microscopy in a UV Micropatterned Array

The physical and molecular heterogeneity of extracellular vesicles (EVs) confounds bulk biomarker characterization, thus encouraging the development of novel assays capable of profiling EVs at a single-vesicle resolution. Here, we present a single EV (siEV) protein and RNA assay (siEVPRA) to simultaneously detect proteins, messenger RNAs (mRNAs), and microRNAs (miRNAs) in siEVs. The siEVPRA consists of an array of microdomains embedded on a polyethylene glycol (PEG)-coated glass surface produced via UV photopatterning, functionalized with antibodies to target siEV subpopulations. Fluorescently labeled antibodies and RNA-targeting molecular beacons (MBs) were used to generate signals for proteins, mRNAs, and miRNAs on siEVs detected by total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (TIRFM), outperforming the sensitivities of ELISA and PCR by three orders of magnitude. Using the siEVPRA, we analyzed EVs harvested from glioblastoma (GBM) cell lines and demonstrated vesicular heterogeneity in protein, mRNA, and miRNA expression through colocalization analyses, and validated the results by bulk RNA sequencing. We further demonstrated the clinical utility of the siEVPRA by detecting different mRNAs and miRNAs associated with GBM in patient samples. Together, these results indicate that the siEVPRA provides an effective platform to investigate the heterogeneity of proteins and RNAs in subpopulations of EVs.

bioengineering↗

bioRxiv2021

An inactivated multivalent influenza A virus vaccine is broadly protective in mice and ferrets

Influenza A viruses (IAVs) present major public health threats from annual seasonal epidemics, from pandemics caused by novel virus subtypes, and from viruses adapted to a variety of animals including poultry, pigs and horses. Vaccines that broadly protect against all such IAVs, so-called "universal" influenza vaccines, do not currently exist, but are urgently needed. This study demonstrates that an inactivated, multivalent whole virus vaccine, delivered intramuscularly or intranasally, is broadly protective against challenges with multiple IAV HA/NA subtypes in both mice and ferrets, including challenges with IAV subtypes not contained in the vaccine. This vaccine approach indicates the feasibility of eliciting broad "universal" IAV protection, and identifies a promising candidate for influenza vaccine clinical development. One-Sentence SummaryAn inactivated, whole avian influenza virus vaccine delivered intramuscularly or intranasally provides extremely broad protection against antigenically divergent viral challenge and is a promising candidate for a "universal" influenza virus vaccine.

microbiology↗

bioRxiv2020

Multiomic Immunophenotyping of COVID-19 Patients Reveals Early Infection Trajectories

Host immune responses play central roles in controlling SARS-CoV2 infection, yet remain incompletely characterized and understood. Here, we present a comprehensive immune response map spanning 454 proteins and 847 metabolites in plasma integrated with single-cell multi-omic assays of PBMCs in which whole transcriptome, 192 surface proteins, and T and B cell receptor sequence were co-analyzed within the context of clinical measures from 50 COVID19 patient samples. Our study reveals novel cellular subpopulations, such as proliferative exhausted CD8+ and CD4+ T cells, and cytotoxic CD4+ T cells, that may be features of severe COVID-19 infection. We condensed over 1 million immune features into a single immune response axis that independently aligns with many clinical features and is also strongly associated with disease severity. Our study represents an important resource towards understanding the heterogeneous immune responses of COVID-19 patients and may provide key information for informing therapeutic development.

immunology↗