01 / Ways to support
Train emerging scientists
Talk with us about supporting hands-on research training and opportunities for students.
Cystic fibrosis: from cells to connections
Explore microscopy from our lab, then discover the models and measurements behind our cystic fibrosis and CFTR-modulator research.
Inside our flagship program
Cystic fibrosis.
A closer look.
What changes when we connect the models? Explore the cultures and measurements behind our research into CF and its treatments.
Explore the models
Explore the cystic fibrosis research story
01 / The starting point
Many models.
One shared question.
We study sensory, autonomic and central neurons alongside intestinal epithelium, muscle and human-derived brain tissue. Comparing these models helps us ask where CF-associated changes begin and how modulators affect each component.
Select a specimen to meet the models behind the work.
Data collection underwayTap or click a specimen to explore
Primary cultures, stem-cell-derived models and tissue preparations offer complementary views.
The question across every model
What changes in CF?
What changes with treatment?
Compare cystic fibrosis models homozygous for F508del with heterozygous carriers and wild-type controls, and explore treatment conditions across the research models.
01 / Compare models
02 / Compare conditions
Study design · No experimental results shown
Living library
Our cultures include human stem cells; primary DRG, SCG, enteric and hippocampal neurons; intestinal organoids; human-stem-cell-derived brain organoids; and smooth muscle. Intestinal organ-bath work provides a separate tissue preparation, and whole-animal gut transit extends the work to the whole animal.
Gut-on-a-chip
Our gut-on-a-chip combines DRG sensory neurons, enteric neurons and intestinal organoids. Studying components separately and together helps us ask whether CF or modulators change neuronal physiology, the gut lining or communication between them.
Watch movement
Does a motility difference begin in muscle cells, emerge within intestinal tissue, or depend on the intact animal? Smooth-muscle culture, organ-bath recordings and gut-transit measurements address these questions at complementary scales.
Brain questions
We compare direct modulator exposure in hippocampal cultures with brain slices collected after systemic treatment, and add human-stem-cell-derived brain organoids. Together, these models test how CF and modulators may influence neuronal physiology.
Future connections
We plan human stem-cell-derived sympathetic, enteric and hippocampal neurons and cardiac muscle. A future SCG-like neuron–cardiac co-culture will ask whether responses begin in the nerve cells, the muscle cells or their interaction.
Across these models, our research aims to compare cystic fibrosis models homozygous for F508del with heterozygous carriers and wild-type controls, and to investigate responses across treatment conditions, including Trikafta (ETI) and Alyftrek (VTD).
About the brain research question & treatment names
ETI combines elexacaftor, tezacaftor and ivacaftor (Trikafta). VTD combines vanzacaftor, tezacaftor and deutivacaftor (Alyftrek).
Current U.S. prescribing information describes postmarketing neuropsychiatric reports in people taking these treatments or drugs with the same or similar active ingredients. These reports motivate questions; they do not establish the cellular mechanism being investigated here. Data collection is underway in the brain research shown above.
Trikafta prescribing information ↗Alyftrek prescribing information ↗
From models to measurements
The next step: listen to the cells.
Explore the techniques we use to record activity, image connections and measure function.