Kristen Nielsen
Associate Professor
University of Minnesota Twin Cities
USA
Biography
Dr. Nielsen received her doctorate from North Carolina State University in 2001. Later, she joined University of Minnesota as Assistant Professor and is currently working there as an associate professor of microbiology. Her research interests include fungal infectious diseases. Her laboratory is focussed on studies of Cryptococcus neoformans. It is an opportunistic human pathogenic fungus that causes cryptococcosis, which commonly presents as a disseminated meningoencephalitis that is universally fatal if untreated. An integral and defining feature of cryptococcosis is the ability of C. neoformans to cross the blood-brain barrier. In recent years the process of C. neoformans entry into the central nervous system (CNS) has begun to be elucidated, but the methods by which C. neoformansinduces these processes remains unknown. If the mechanisms by which C. neoformans crosses the blood-brain barrier can be identified and characterized, treatment strategies can be designed to reduce C. neoformans entry into the CNS to alleviate disease symptoms and permit increased exposure to antifungal drugs. Her work has been published in many peer-reviewed international journals.
Research Interest
Cryptococcus neoformans and CNS disorders