Brian Michael Luna, PhD

In the United States there has been a rapid increase in the disease burden caused by antibiotic resistant members of the ESKAPE pathogens: Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacter species. Nearly 3 million infections and approximately 36,000 deaths were attributed to antibiotic resistant infections in the US in 2019. Globally in 2019, antimicrobial resistance was associated with 4.95 million deaths. Continued research is needed to develop novel and effective therapeutics. Our lab is interested in the development of traditional small molecule antibiotics, therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, and vaccines to combat antimicrobial resistance. We use multiple research strategies including synthetic biology, microbial genetics, next-generation sequencing, and preclinical mouse models in our work.

• Characterizing trained innate immunity mediated by AMMO
  NIH · R01AI198971 · Jul 7, 2026 – Jun 30, 2031 · Role: Principal Investigator
• A novel eNAMPT-neutralizing mAb to reduce antimicrobial resistance following hospital- and ventilator-associated bacterial pneumonia
  NIH · R01AI189492 · Jun 24, 2026 – May 31, 2031 · Role: Co-Principal Investigator
• Identifying Synergistic Rifabutin-Containing Combinations Against A. baumannii
  NIH · R01AI179046 · Mar 11, 2024 – Oct 31, 2030 · Role: Principal Investigator
• Characterization of Rifabutin Therapy Against Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria
  NIH · R01AI139052 · Aug 10, 2018 – Jul 31, 2022 · Role: Principal Investigator

• Slarve, Matthew
• Klausner, Jeffrey
• Neely, Michael
• Paranos, Paschalis
• Rao, Gauri
• Tran, Jennifer