Dominic Ritacco is a graduate student in the Gaudet lab at Columbia University’s Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Dominic received his B.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has previously conducted infectious disease research in the Moormann lab at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School and cell physiology research in the Cantor lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dominic is broadly interested in host-pathogen interactions and the effector mechanisms underlying immunity.
In the Gaudet lab, Dominic studies how non-immune cells contribute to a holistic immune response through the induction of interferon-stimulated genes (ISGs). These ISGs are crucial for the defense against viral, bacterial, fungal, and protozoan pathogens. However, increasing evidence suggests that these ISGs are mobilized in a tissue- and cell type-specific manner. Dominic hopes to uncover whether this heterogeneity in interferon-induced effector expression could lead to increased pathogen susceptibility for specific tissues or cell types- a concept known as tropism.