Grant: Project Grant

Allergic diseases including food allergies and asthma are increasing world-wide and increasing evidence suggest that this is driven, at least in part, by changes in the Western lifestyle and early life environmental factors. Previously we showed in both animal models and human birth cohorts that alterations in the bacteria that newborns are exposed to can have a profound influence on the future development of allergic disease. More recently, by examining the types of cells present in human umbilical cord blood we obtained provocative preliminary data to suggest that, in fact, children who go on to develop allergies already displayed differences in their blood cells at birth. These data would suggest that, potentially, susceptibility to allergic disease may have already been established during pregnancy. Accordingly, the goal of this research is to use an animal model (mouse) to unravel the types of environmental exposures during pregnancy that determine future susceptibility to allergy. Successful completion of this research could lead to simple new strategies to dampen the chances of new borns and adolescents developing allergic disease.