Sara Suliman, PhD, MPH

Assistant Prof In Residence
Medicine
[email protected]

Tuberculosis (TB) disease, caused by infection with the intracellular pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) remains a leading cause of mortality globally. Interestingly, only 5-10% of Mtb-exposed individuals are estimated to develop active TB in their lifetime, thus posing host-specific factors as mediators of risk of progression to disease. These host factors include several defects in innate and adaptive immunity, metabolic dysregulation, co-infections and comorbidities, and genetic polymorphisms that could mediate susceptibility to TB disease. The focus of the Suliman laboratory is to generate hypotheses from systems biology approaches, such as genome-wide association studies, transcriptional and metabolomic profiling, and expression quantitative trait loci, to identify candidate TB risk pathways and functionally evaluate their roles in TB progression.

UCSF Center for Tuberculosis Initiatives:
World TB Day Planning Committee 2022-23

Publications: 

Leveraging community engagement to shape biomedical research priorities.

Trends in immunology

Suliman S, Agyei L, Afzal SA, Williams S

The promise and reality of new immune profiling technologies.

Nature immunology

Suliman S, Maison DP, Henrich TJ

Unmasking the hidden impact of viruses on tuberculosis risk.

Trends in immunology

Darboe F, Reijneveld JF, Maison DP, Martinez L, Suliman S

Predicting pediatric TB: the need for age-specific host biosignatures.

Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America

Suliman S, Jaganath D, DiNardo A

BCG: From veins to correlates.

Cell host & microbe

Suliman S

Evaluation of the Access Bio CareStart rapid SARS-CoV-2 antigen test in asymptomatic individuals tested at a community mass-testing program in Western Massachusetts.

Scientific reports

Suliman S, Matias WR, Fulcher IR, Molano FJ, Collins S, Uceta E, Zhu J, Paxton RM, Gonsalves SF, Harden MV, Fisher M, Meldrim J, Gabriel S, Franke MF, Hung DT, Smole SC, Madoff LC, Ivers LC

Dual TCR-α Expression on Mucosal-Associated Invariant T Cells as a Potential Confounder of TCR Interpretation.

Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950)

Suliman S, Kjer-Nielsen L, Iwany SK, Lopez Tamara K, Loh L, Grzelak L, Kedzierska K, Ocampo TA, Corbett AJ, McCluskey J, Rossjohn J, León SR, Calderon R, Lecca-Garcia L, Murray MB, Moody DB, Van Rhijn I

Evaluation of serological lateral flow assays for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2.

BMC infectious diseases

Trombetta BA, Kandigian SE, Kitchen RR, Grauwet K, Webb PK, Miller GA, Jennings CG, Jain S, Miller S, Kuo Y, Sweeney T, Gilboa T, Norman M, Simmons DP, Ramirez CE, Bedard M, Fink C, Ko J, De León Peralta EJ, Watts G, Gomez-Rivas E, Davis V, Barilla RM, Wang J, Cunin P, Bates S, Morrison-Smith C, Nicholson B, Wong E, El-Mufti L, Kann M, Bolling A, Fortin B, Ventresca H, Zhou W, Pardo S, Kwock M, Hazra A, Cheng L, Ahmad QR, Toombs JA, Larson R, Pleskow H, Luo NM, Samaha C, Pandya UM, De Silva P, Zhou S, Ganhadeiro Z, Yohannes S, Gay R, Slavik J, Mukerji SS, Jarolim P, Walt DR, Carlyle BC, Ritterhouse LL, Suliman S

Multimodally profiling memory T cells from a tuberculosis cohort identifies cell state associations with demographics, environment and disease.

Nature immunology

Nathan A, Beynor JI, Baglaenko Y, Suliman S, Ishigaki K, Asgari S, Huang CC, Luo Y, Zhang Z, Lopez K, Lindestam Arlehamn CS, Ernst JD, Jimenez J, Calderón RI, Lecca L, Van Rhijn I, Moody DB, Murray MB, Raychaudhuri S

Peripheral Blood Mucosal-Associated Invariant T Cells in Tuberculosis Patients and Healthy Mycobacterium tuberculosis-Exposed Controls.

The Journal of infectious diseases

Suliman S, Gela A, Mendelsohn SC, Iwany SK, Tamara KL, Mabwe S, Bilek N, Darboe F, Fisher M, Corbett AJ, Kjer-Nielsen L, Eckle SBG, Huang CC, Zhang Z, Lewinsohn DM, McCluskey J, Rossjohn J, Hatherill M, León SR, Calderon RI, Lecca L, Murray M, Scriba TJ, Van Rhijn I, Moody DB

MR1-Independent Activation of Human Mucosal-Associated Invariant T Cells by Mycobacteria.

Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950)

Suliman S, Murphy M, Musvosvi M, Gela A, Meermeier EW, Geldenhuys H, Hopley C, Toefy A, Bilek N, Veldsman A, Hanekom WA, Johnson JL, Boom WH, Obermoser G, Huang H, Hatherill M, Lewinsohn DM, Nemes E, Scriba TJ

Early progression to active tuberculosis is a highly heritable trait driven by 3q23 in Peruvians.

Nature communications

Luo Y, Suliman S, Asgari S, Amariuta T, Baglaenko Y, Martínez-Bonet M, Ishigaki K, Gutierrez-Arcelus M, Calderon R, Lecca L, León SR, Jimenez J, Yataco R, Contreras C, Galea JT, Becerra M, Nejentsev S, Nigrovic PA, Moody DB, Murray MB, Raychaudhuri S

Four-Gene Pan-African Blood Signature Predicts Progression to Tuberculosis.

American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine

Suliman S, Thompson EG, Sutherland J, Weiner J, Ota MOC, Shankar S, Penn-Nicholson A, Thiel B, Erasmus M, Maertzdorf J, Duffy FJ, Hill PC, Hughes EJ, Stanley K, Downing K, Fisher ML, Valvo J, Parida SK, van der Spuy G, Tromp G, Adetifa IMO, Donkor S, Howe R, Mayanja-Kizza H, Boom WH, Dockrell HM, Ottenhoff THM, Hatherill M, Aderem A, Hanekom WA, Scriba TJ, Kaufmann SHE, Zak DE, Walzl G, GC6-74 cohort study team, The ACS cohort study team

Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) Revaccination of Adults with Latent Mycobacterium tuberculosis Infection Induces Long-Lived BCG-Reactive NK Cell Responses.

Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950)

Suliman S, Geldenhuys H, Johnson JL, Hughes JE, Smit E, Murphy M, Toefy A, Lerumo L, Hopley C, Pienaar B, Chheng P, Nemes E, Hoft DF, Hanekom WA, Boom WH, Hatherill M, Scriba TJ