Trudeau Institute

Trudeau Institute Science with purpose, discovery with impact, rooted in the Adirondacks, advancing health worldwide. Founded in 1884, we’re a nonprofit and the first U.S.

lab dedicated to tuberculosis research, still vital to global health today.

How does the body’s immune response to tuberculosis shape new ways to fight it? John Chan, Professor of Medicine, Instit...
04/04/2026

How does the body’s immune response to tuberculosis shape new ways to fight it?

John Chan, Professor of Medicine, Institute for Infectious and Inflammatory Diseases at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School presented research at on how our immune system responds to tuberculosis.

“We are studying how our body reacts to Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the bacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB). Specifically, we are doing experiments to characterize the antibodies that are made by our B cells when we get exposed to Mtb. The information generated from these experiments can teach us how antibodies regulate our immune response to the bacterium, and could reveal new approach to diagnose, treat, or prevent TB.”

How does tuberculosis survive long enough in the air to infect the next person? Christopher Brown, MD, PhD, Assistant Pr...
04/03/2026

How does tuberculosis survive long enough in the air to infect the next person?

Christopher Brown, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, presented research at on how drug-resistant TB withstands this critical phase of transmission, and how it might be stopped.

“We study how the bacteria that cause tuberculosis spread from one person to the next through the air. During this time, the bacteria dry out and become damaged. We discovered a gene, mfd, that helps drug-resistant tuberculosis survive this damage. By targeting mfd, we may one day be able to stop drug-resistant tuberculosis from spreading.”

Why do some tuberculosis bacteria survive treatment while others don’t? Hesper Rego, Associate Professor of Microbial P...
04/03/2026

Why do some tuberculosis bacteria survive treatment while others don’t?

Hesper Rego, Associate Professor of Microbial Pathogenesis at Yale School of Medicine, shared work at on how individual tuberculosis bacteria behave differently from one another, even when they are genetically identical.

“We’re studying how tuberculosis bacteria vary from cell to cell, and how those differences affect how well antibiotics work. Even within the same environment and with the same genetic information, not all bacteria are alike. They can differ in how they grow and how they use nutrients, and these differences can make a few bacteria much harder to kill with antibiotics.

We’re applying new tools that allow us to measure the metabolism of individual bacterial cells in real time, rather than averaging across millions of cells. This lets us uncover hidden subpopulations that would otherwise go unnoticed.

Our goal is to understand why some bacteria survive treatment and use that knowledge to design therapies that are more effective and shorten the time needed to cure tuberculosis.”

How could better use of data improve TB treatment? Evan Johnson, Professor of Medicine, Center for Data Science at Rutge...
04/02/2026

How could better use of data improve TB treatment?

Evan Johnson, Professor of Medicine, Center for Data Science at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, shared work at the on using artificial intelligence to bring together complex TB data and make it more useful.

“We’re developing new AI tools to better understand tuberculosis and improve how it’s treated.

Right now, important data like patient records, scans, and genetic information often sits in separate systems and isn’t easy to combine. We’re building tools that can bring this information together and make sense of it.

The goal is to identify patterns that help predict how patients will respond to treatment and who may have lasting lung damage. To do this, we’re creating an AI system that can analyze complex data quickly and help researchers move faster toward better treatments.”

Why does tuberculosis behave differently across species and what can teach us about how to fight infection? At the North...
03/31/2026

Why does tuberculosis behave differently across species and what can teach us about how to fight infection?

At the Northeast Regional World TB Day Conference, researchers shared work that reflects a core challenge in TB: the disease is complex, and solving it requires looking at it from multiple angles.

Over the coming days, we’ll be sharing highlights from presenters across the conference.

Marcel Behr, PhD, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at McGill University, presented his work on differences between human and bovine TB and what they reveal about infection and immune response.

“We study how the bacteria that cause tuberculosis in humans and cattle are similar or different. These bacteria cause a similar disease, TB or bovine TB, but show important differences in how much disease they cause and how quickly it develops. By understanding these differences, we hope to identify new ways that humans and cattle respond to infection and how those responses can be enhanced.”

The Northeast Regional World TB Day Conference has come to a close. Thank you to everyone who joined us in Saranac Lake ...
03/25/2026

The Northeast Regional World TB Day Conference has come to a close. Thank you to everyone who joined us in Saranac Lake to share ideas, connect, and move this work forward.

We are grateful to the Potts Memorial Foundation for their generous support, which made this gathering possible.

Safe travels home. We’re glad you made the trip to the Adirondacks!

We’ll be sharing highlights from our presenters throughout the coming week.

During the World TB Day conference, TB researchers visited the Saranac Laboratory Museum, established in 1894 by Dr. Edw...
03/25/2026

During the World TB Day conference, TB researchers visited the Saranac Laboratory Museum, established in 1894 by Dr. Edward Livingston Trudeau as the first U.S. laboratory dedicated to tuberculosis research.

In 1964, that work moved to Trudeau Institute, where it continues today.

A rare opportunity for today’s TB research community to stand in the lab where the field began in the United States, and see how far the work has come.

Historic Saranac Lake

On World TB Day, we were grateful to welcome colleagues from across the Northeast and beyond to Saranac Lake, the birthp...
03/24/2026

On World TB Day, we were grateful to welcome colleagues from across the Northeast and beyond to Saranac Lake, the birthplace of tuberculosis research in the United States.

It was especially meaningful to gather here, where that work began and continues today, to share ideas, build connections, and reflect on the progress still needed to end TB.

Why is TB still here and still so deadly? TB is a complex disease. It can persist in individuals for years, requires lon...
03/23/2026

Why is TB still here and still so deadly?

TB is a complex disease. It can persist in individuals for years, requires long, multi-drug treatment, and drug-resistant strains continue to emerge.

These realities make TB difficult to eliminate and underscore the importance of continued research and collaboration.

Read more: https://www.who.int/health-topics/tuberculosis

Dr. Michaelle Chojnacki at Trudeau Institute has been awarded two competitive NIH grants to develop new approaches for t...
03/19/2026

Dr. Michaelle Chojnacki at Trudeau Institute has been awarded two competitive NIH grants to develop new approaches for treating tuberculosis, one of the world’s deadliest infectious diseases. Her NIH R01 proposal ranked in the top tier of applications nationally.

Her work focuses on identifying new ways to attack the bacteria, approaches that could lead to faster, more effective treatments and help overcome the limitations of current drugs. One project builds on a promising compound that targets TB in a completely new way, while another explores strategies to eliminate “dormant” bacteria that are especially difficult to treat.

Tuberculosis continues to claim more than 1.3 million lives each year, and drug resistance is making treatment more difficult worldwide. Research like this is critical to developing better solutions.

This work is supported through federal investment in science and reflects Trudeau Institute’s role in advancing innovative solutions to global health challenges.

Read more: https://www.trudeauinstitute.org/news/dr-michaelle-chojnacki-awarded-two-nih-grants-to-advance-innovative-new-treatments-for-tuberculosis

We are proud to welcome the return of the Northeast Regional World TB Day Conference to the Trudeau Institute, where it ...
03/18/2026

We are proud to welcome the return of the Northeast Regional World TB Day Conference to the Trudeau Institute, where it first began in 2009.

Next week’s gathering brings together scientists, researchers, and public health leaders from across the region, united by a shared focus on tuberculosis research and prevention.

World TB Day (March 24) is a global reminder that TB remains the leading infectious disease killer worldwide, responsible for ~1 to 2 million deaths each year. Continued research and collaboration are essential to ending it.

Hosting this conference in Saranac Lake connects that global effort to a place deeply rooted in the history of TB research, while highlighting the work being done today.

We welcomed advanced science and math students from Tupper Lake Central School District High School to “Science Behind t...
03/18/2026

We welcomed advanced science and math students from Tupper Lake Central School District High School to “Science Behind the Scenes,” our career exploration program at Trudeau Institute. Students participated in a variety of career seminars led by scientific staff and toured cutting-edge laboratory facilities. Support for this program is generously provided by the Cloudsplitter Foundation.

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