About
Martin Blaser seeks to understand the relationships we have with our persistently colonizing bacteria.
His work over the past 30 years has focused on human pathogens, including Campylobacter species and Helicobacter pylori, which are model systems for understanding interactions of residential bacteria with their human hosts. Over the last decade, Blaser has actively studied the relationship of the human microbiome with humans in terms of evolution, persistence mechanisms, host-interactions and population dynamics. He has looked at extinctions of ancient microbiota constituents. This research has implications for health, relating to asthma, obesity, diabetes and allergies.
Awards
- Alexander Fleming Award, 2014
- Infectious Diseases Society of America Oswald Avery Award, 1992
Relevant Publications
Blaser, M.J. et al., eds. Infections of the Gastrointestinal Tract. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins, 2014.
Bennett, J., R. Dolin, and M.J. Blaser, eds. Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases. 8th ed. Philadelphia: Elsevier, 2014.
Blaser, M.J. Missing Microbes: How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues. New York: Henry Holt and Co, 2014.
Cox, L.M. et al. “Altering the intestinal microbiota during a critical developmental window has lasting metabolic consequences.” Cell 158 (2014): 705–21.
Cho, I. et al. “Antibiotics in early life alter the murine colonic microbiome and adiposity.” Nature 488 (2012): 621–26.