MISSION
The Bonavia laboratory adopts an innovative blend of immunological and machine learning methodologies, integrating blood biomarkers with extensive clinical datasets from septic, critically ill patients. The main objective is to devise high-precision models capable of diagnosing sepsis earlier than traditional models, thereby facilitating clinical intervention to potentially improve patient outcomes.
Immune Phenotyping as a Strategy to Elucidate Different Sepsis Endotypes
This project uses functional immune profiling, rather than conventional serum biomarker analysis, to quantify subclinical immune dysfunction in septic patients. The laboratory utilizes an assortment of assays to examine both innate and adaptive immune dysfunction, thus more precisely placing a patient on the hyperinflammatory-hypoinflammatory spectrum.
Utilizing SOFA Score for Earlier Sepsis Detection and Reliable Mortality Prediction
According to the Sepsis-3 criteria, sepsis is defined as infection complicated by a dysregulated host immune response leading to organ dysfunction. The laboratory is employing computational approaches and large datasets to develop novel, sensitive methods for early sepsis diagnosis and the utilization of SOFA as a sepsis prognosticator.
Examining the Impact of Low Muscle Mass and Muscle Dysfunction on Long-term Outcomes Following Sepsis
A significant portion of sepsis-related morbidity manifests in the days to weeks following the resolution of acute sepsis, including cognitive, renal and metabolic dysfunction. The laboratory conducts comprehensive retrospective and prospective analyses to identify catabolism and loss of muscle post-sepsis, and then links this data to changes in muscle at the molecular level.
Sepsis Biorepository
The Bonavia laboratory serves as a repository for de-identified clinical data and specimens collected from both critically ill patients who have experienced sepsis and those who haven't. These samples have been meticulously preserved to facilitate ongoing and prospective research endeavors aimed at enhancing our understanding of the diagnosis and treatment of sepsis in patients. Alongside the clinical data, the laboratory also houses immunologic and transcriptomic information derived from the patient samples stored within the institutional biorepository. This comprehensive collection provides a valuable resource for advancing scientific knowledge in the field.
Laboratory Personnel
Anthony Bonavia, MD FCCP
Primary Investigator
Dr. Bonavia is a clinician-scientist, trained as an anesthesiogist with sub-specialty training in critical care medicine. Besides actively practicing as a board-certified anesthesiologist and surgical intensivist at Penn State Hershey Medical Center, he also directs the institution's Sepsis and Critical Illness Research Center and runs his own immunology-based laboratory.His ORCID profile can be found here.
RuthAnn Brown, BA
Research Technologist
RuthAnn completed her undergraduate stuides at East Stroudsburg University, PA and worked in healthcare prior to joining the laboratory in May 2024.
Ahad Khaleghi Ardabili, PhD
Postdoctoral fellow, data scientist
Dr Khaleghi obtained his Ph.D. in Physics at Koç University, in Istanbul, Turkey. Previously, Dr. Khaleghi worked as assistant professor of Machine Learning and Physics at Altınbaş University, Istanbul, Turkey. After moving to the US, he worked as a data scientist for a cloud computing company prior to joining our lab. His peer-reviewed publications can be found here.
Grants and Publications
Extramural Grants
We have been fortunate enough that our hard work has received federal funding over the past few years. A list of the Primary Investigator's extramural grants can be found here
Publications
We take pride in the timely dissemination of knowledge and cutting-edge laboratory findings.
A chronologic listing of the laboratory's peer-reviewed publications can be found here
