Andres Hidalgo, PhD

I am interested on the cellular and molecular mechanisms by which innate immune cells, and their hematopoietic precursors, contribute to organismal physiology and pathology. As a postdoctoral trainee I developed and used live imaging modalities to study acute inflammatory disease and discovered the receptors that mediate early neutrophil recruitment, and the signals that cause acute vascular injury. As an independent researcher at CNIC (Spain), my laboratory further developed tools to study of thrombo-inflammation and the dramatic consequences in several organs, including the lung, brain and heart. We discovered new functions for innate immune cells, and demonstrated that circadian rhythms in the bone marrow are entrained in part by neutrophils entering this organ, and that these rhythms are critical for immune defense and inflammation. I am also interested in other type of innate immune cells, such as resident macrophages of the heart. As a Professor at Yale, I am interested in defining the fundamental organization and function of innate immune cells, from their development and specification under homeostasis, to their reparative or disease-promoting roles.