Maria Curotto de Lafaille, PhD & Principal Investigator, is a Professor of Pediatrics, Immunology and Immunotherapy, and a member of the Jaffe Food Allergy and the Precision Immunology Institutes at Mount Sinai. She obtained her PhD degree in Immunology from the University of São Paulo in Brazil and received her postdoctoral training at Harvard University. Dr. Lafaille made groundbreaking contributions to the fields of mucosal tolerance and allergic sensitization. The main interests of her laboratory are the mechanisms of B cell memory in mice and human allergy, and the immunopathology of chronic allergic inflammation.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Mariana is a postdoctoral fellow from Brazil. She obtained her PhD in Immunology from the University of Minas Gerais in Belo Horizonte. In her doctoral work, she characterized the changes in the intestinal immune system that take place during the onset of type 1 diabetes in mice. She is currently working on the transcriptional and metabolic features that defines IgE plasma cells biology and its particular generation dynamics.

PhD Candidate

Jamie is a 3rd year PhD Candidate in the Immunology multidisciplinary training area of the Biomedical Sciences PhD program at Mount Sinai. Before matriculating at Mount Sinai, Jamie received training at the National Institute of Health as a post baccalaureate fellow. During this time she discovered her interest in mechanisms regulating allergic disease and tolerance. Her current project in the Lafaille lab focuses on characterizing IgG+ memory B cells in mouse models of food allergy.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Weslley obtained his PhD in Biochemistry and Immunology from the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil, where he also received postdoctoral training in Cardiovascular Diseases in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics. His previous research addressed disease mechanisms and therapeutic targets in cardiovascular and metabolic disease. Weslley’s current work focuses on the mechanisms that account for the resolution or persistence of human allergic responses.

Associate Researcher I

Pedro is currently an associate researcher in the Lafaille lab. He previously worked in the Andrade lab at Mount Sinai producing and developing monoclonal antibodies for cancer immunotherapy. In the Lafaille lab Pedro’s has many responsibilities that contribute to the smooth running of the lab, such as managing the mouse colony, maintaining inventory of supplies, keeping safety compliance, and bringing overall positivity to all members of the lab.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Maria was born in Ecuador, where she became fluent in French and Spanish. She moved to Baltimore, where she became fluent in English and earned a Ph.D. in Immunology from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. As part of her doctorate, she also worked as a visiting scholar at Columbia University while living in the Heights and writing immunopoetry on the side. She is a post-doctoral fellow at the Lafaille lab, where she is studying lung pathology in Hyper-IgE Syndrome, also called Job Syndrome.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Edenil obtained his Ph.D. in Immunology at the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil. He also received postdoctoral training at the Department of Physiology and Biophysics and another at the Department of Biochemistry and Immunology. He studied the effect of nutrients on inflammatory and oxidative responses associated with atherosclerosis and obesity. He is a postdoc at Lafaille Lab, focusing on germinal center development and B-cell memory generation.

Masters Candidate

Maya is a final year Masters Candidate in the Biomedical Sciences program at Mount Sinai. Maya received her undergraduate degree in Biological Sciences, from India, and graduated in three years with honors.

Maya's research interests lie in immunological memory, tolerance and plasticity. Her current project in the Lafaille lab focuses on characterizing type 2 immune response in mouse models.