Biography

The Moreno Lab focuses on the emergence and evolution of bacterial pathogens. Our major research interests include elucidating the molecular strategies that bacterial pathogens develop for host colonization, virulence regulation and dispersal from the host. Furthermore, we are interested in the connection that ecosystems and manmade environmental perturbations (e.g. climate change, pollution) have in their pathogenic potential and transmission.

Our research program focuses on several pathogenic members of the Vibrionaceae, a family of aquatic bacteria, as model systems. Our investigations have an emphasis on the intestinal pathogen Vibrio cholerae, which represents a paradigm of infectious disease agents, and Vibrio vulnificus, a poorly understood emergent zoonotic pathogen source of a fulminant septicemia.

Our research approach strives to be holistic and multidisciplinary; what we call “From Bays to Bases”. It encompasses a mix of molecular biology, genomics, phylogenetics, pathogenesis, and ecology. We believe that by understanding pathogen evolution and ecology, we will ultimately gain the knowledge that will allow us to forecast the traits of emergent virulent strains, predict the sources of outbreaks, and to design reliable therapeutic treatments against bacterial threats.

Research in The Moreno Lab has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration or the Binational Science Foundation. Dr. Almagro-Moreno has been recipient of numerous awards and honors including the National Science Foundation CAREER Award.

To learn more about The Moreno Lab please visit:  www.vibriocholerae.org

Recent Publications

1. Balasubramanian D, Murcia S, Ogbunugafor CB, Gavilan R, Almagro-Moreno S*. Cholera dynamics: lessons from an epidemic. Journal of Medical Microbiology. 2021
2. Haro-Moreno JM, Hernandes Coutinho F, Zaragoza-Solas A, Picazo A, Almagro-Moreno S, López-Pérez M. Dysbiosis in marine aquaculture revealed through microbiome analysis: reverse ecology for environmental sustainability. FEMS Microbiology Ecology. 2020
3. Jayakumar JM, Balasubramanian D, Reddi G^#, Almagro-Moreno S*. Synergistic role of abiotic factors driving viable but non-culturable Vibrio cholerae. Environmental Microbiology Reports. 2020
4. Jayakumar JM, Shapiro OH, Almagro-Moreno S*. Improved method for transformation of Vibrio vulnificus by electroporation. Current Protocols in Microbiology. 2020
5. Meszaros VA, Miller-Dickson MD, Baffour-Awuah F, Almagro-Moreno S, Ogbunugafor BC. Direct transmission via households informs models of disease and intervention dynamics in cholera. PLoS One. 2020
6. Miller-Dickson MD, Meszaros VA, Almagro-MorenoS, Ogbunugafor BC. Hepatitis C virus modelled as an indirectly transmitted infection highlights the centrality of injection drug equipment in disease dynamics. Journal of the Royal Society Interface. 2019