Lenette Lu, M.D., Ph.D.
Assistant Professor

Dr. Lu is an infectious disease physician scientist. While her clinical service is centered at Parkland, she spends most of her time in lab with a long-standing interest on the host relationship with microbes. Her doctoral work in molecular virology focused on innate immune signaling in the context of viral infections. Motivated by the global health burden of tuberculosis (TB) and captivated by the persistent relationship between the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) and humans, her postdoctoral work turned toward TB through the lens of humoral immunity. She showed divergent immunoglobulin profiles in patients with clinically well characterized Mtb infection and TB disease states, highlighted by differential antibody glycosylation and effector functions. Moving beyond the clinically well-established states of Mtb infection and TB disease, she demonstrated that individuals highly exposed to Mtb yet not captured by current clinical diagnostics have developed adaptive immune responses to Mtb. These observations provide immunological parameters to broaden the definition of human Mtb infection and provide an additional perspective through which the host response to Mtb can be examined. Beyond TB, the study of antibodies in infectious diseases helps construct a more in-depth framework to understand how the landscape of humoral immunity mediates the interface of host microbial interactions, and creates paths towards biomarker and vaccine development. The long-term goal is to translate observations from humans to models of disease in order to further inform and direct human studies, realizing the remarkable potential in the synergy between science and medicine.

Graduate School

Case Western Reserve University (2009), Molecular Virology

Medical School

Case Western Reserve University (2010)

Residency

New York Presbyterian Hospital, Cornell Campus (2013), Internal Medicine

Fellowship

Massachusetts General Hospital (2015), Infectious Diseases

• Antibody Effector Functions
• Antibody Glycosylation
• Host Microbial Interactions
• Humoral Immunity
• Tuberculosis

Featured Publications

IFN-?-independent immune markers of Mycobacterium tuberculosis exposure.

Lu LL, Smith MT, Yu KKQ, Luedemann C, Suscovich TJ, Grace PS, Cain A, Yu WH, McKitrick TR, Lauffenburger D, Cummings RD, Mayanja-Kizza H, Hawn TR, Boom WH, Stein CM, Fortune SM, Seshadri C, Alter G, Nat. Med. 2019 06 25 6 977-987

Moving toward Tuberculosis Elimination. Critical Issues for Research in Diagnostics and Therapeutics for Tuberculosis Infection.

Keshavjee S, Amanullah F, Cattamanchi A, Chaisson R, Dobos KM, Fox GJ, Gendelman HE, Gordon R, Hesseling A, Le Van H, Kampmann B, Kana B, Khuller G, Lewinsohn DM, Lewinsohn DA, Lin PL, Lu LL, Maartens G, Owen A, Protopopova M, Rengarajan J, Rubin E, Salgame P, Schurr E, Seddon JA, Swindells S, Tobin DM, Udwadia Z, Walzl G, Srinivasan S, Rustomjee R, Nahid P, Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med. 2019 Mar 199 5 564-571

Introduction: Physician-Scientists in the Evolving Landscape of Biomedical Research.

Lu LL, Kwon DS, Barczak AK, J. Infect. Dis. 2018 Aug 218 suppl_1 S1-S2

Prevention of tuberculosis in rhesus macaques by a cytomegalovirus-based vaccine.

Hansen SG, Zak DE, Xu G, Ford JC, Marshall EE, Malouli D, Gilbride RM, Hughes CM, Ventura AB, Ainslie E, Randall KT, Selseth AN, Rundstrom P, Herlache L, Lewis MS, Park H, Planer SL, Turner JM, Fischer M, Armstrong C, Zweig RC, Valvo J, Braun JM, Shankar S, Lu L, Sylwester AW, Legasse AW, Messerle M, Jarvis MA, Amon LM, Aderem A, Alter G, Laddy DJ, Stone M, Bonavia A, Evans TG, Axthelm MK, Früh K, Edlefsen PT, Picker LJ, Nat. Med. 2018 02 24 2 130-143

Beyond binding: antibody effector functions in infectious diseases.

Lu LL, Suscovich TJ, Fortune SM, Alter G, Nat. Rev. Immunol. 2018 Jan 18 1 46-61

The TLR-4 agonist adjuvant, GLA-SE, improves magnitude and quality of immune responses elicited by the ID93 tuberculosis vaccine: first-in-human trial.

Coler RN, Day TA, Ellis R, Piazza FM, Beckmann AM, Vergara J, Rolf T, Lu L, Alter G, Hokey D, Jayashankar L, Walker R, Snowden MA, Evans T, Ginsberg A, Reed SG, NPJ Vaccines 2018 3 34

A Functional Role for Antibodies in Tuberculosis.

Lu LL, Chung AW, Rosebrock TR, Ghebremichael M, Yu WH, Grace PS, Schoen MK, Tafesse F, Martin C, Leung V, Mahan AE, Sips M, Kumar MP, Tedesco J, Robinson H, Tkachenko E, Draghi M, Freedberg KJ, Streeck H, Suscovich TJ, Lauffenburger DA, Restrepo BI, Day C, Fortune SM, Alter G, Cell 2016 Oct 167 2 433-443.e14

Select paramyxoviral V proteins inhibit IRF3 activation by acting as alternative substrates for inhibitor of kappaB kinase epsilon (IKKe)/TBK1.

Lu LL, Puri M, Horvath CM, Sen GC, J. Biol. Chem. 2008 May 283 21 14269-76

Mutations in SID2, a novel gene in Saccharomyces cerevisiae, cause synthetic lethality with sic1 deletion and may cause a defect during S phase.

Jacobson MD, Muñoz CX, Knox KS, Williams BE, Lu LL, Cross FR, Vallen EA, Genetics 2001 Sep 159 1 17-33

 Featured Books

Babesiosis. In Diagnostic Pathology: Infectious DIseases

Lu, L., and Milner, D. (2015). Canada, Elsevier

Anaplasmosis and Ehrlichiosis. In Diagnostic Pathology: Infectious Diseases

Lu, L., and Milner, C. (2015). Canada, Elsevier

Primary Gram-negative Respiratory Pathogen Infections. In Diagnostic Pathology: Infectious Diseases

Pecora, N., and Lu, L. (2015). Canada, Elsevier

• Disease Oriented Clinical Scholar Award
  UT Southwestern (2019)
• K08 Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award
  NIH (2017)
• Maxwell Finland Award for Excellence in Research
  Massachusetts Infectious Disease Society (2017)
• TB Gift Innovation Award
  The Broad Institute (2017)

• American Association of Immunology (2014)
• Infectious Disease Society of America (2013)