Matthew Walters, Ph.D.

Biography

"The major focus of my research program is to understand the cellular processes that regulate airway epithelial stem/progenitor cell fate decisions during repair and regeneration of the lung. Alterations in the normal ratio of differentiated epithelial cell types (defined as epithelial remodeling) are associated with multiple chronic lung diseases including asthma, cystic fibrosis (CF), idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Major risk factors for development of chronic lung disease include environmental exposures (e.g., cigarette smoke, viral infections) and age. Therefore, the overarching goal of my research is to identify signaling pathways that regulate differentiation of airway epithelial stem/progenitor cells into specific cell types thus providing novel targets for developing new therapies to treat chronic lung disease."

Email

Matthew-S-Walters@ouhsc.edu

Publications

Research Interests:

• Identifying the mechanisms by which cigarette smoke dysregulates secretory cell differentiation in the airway epithelium to induce goblet cell metaplasia
• Characterizing the NOTCH signaling downstream transcriptional responses that regulate differentiation of the airway epithelium during the normal and disease state
• Understanding the impact of aging on airway epithelial stem/progenitor cell function
• Understanding the signaling pathways and cellular interactions within the tissue-specific niche that regulate the stem/progenitor function of airway epithelial basal cells during health and disease
• Characterizing the SARS-CoV-2 host-virus interactions in the human airway epithelium (Collaboration with OUHSC Faculty Dr. James Papin)