Carolina Tropini
- Website Department profile
Dr. Carolina Tropini is an assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the School for Biomedical Engineering. Recently named a Distinguished Investigator by the Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group as the only recipient in Canada, Tropini will work alongside a team of two other researchers. Awarded US$1.5M in funding, the team will pursue research into health, disease and technology centred on the emerging field of immunometabolism.
Dr. Tropini’s work focuses on the human microbiome, exploring how the biodiversity of the trillions of bacteria, fungi and viruses that call the human body home change according to disease. Using cutting edge techniques such as microfluidics alongside computational analysis, her research focuses on the physical environment in the gut and how it affects the microbiome.
Since gut bacteria produce an array of neurochemicals necessary for brain function, Tropini is looking at how reduced biodiversity affects our health in general. Lower biodiversity, for example, could impact microbiome resilience and alter how it responds to pathogens. More specifically she is examining whether microbiota changes in Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) impact the inflammatory environment in the gut. Understanding how the gut environment impacts the microbiome could help personalize therapies to treat IBD effectively.
