Chief, Host Microbe Symbiosis Unit
Independent Research Scholar
Education:
Ph.D., 2017, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
Dr. Gough began her graduate studies at the University of Chicago in 2010, joining the lab of Drs. Olaf Schneewind and Dominique Missiakas, where her research focused on the development of an immunocompromised model of infection with Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) for the purpose of vaccine development. She also studied the function of surface adhesins of S. aureus. In 2013, Dr. Gough joined the Graduate Partnership Program (GPP) with an independent partnership between the University of Chicago and NIAID.
While in the GPP, she completed her thesis work on the responses of human neutrophils to S. aureus under the mentorship of Dr. Sandip Datta. After completing her Ph.D. in microbiology in 2017, she began postdoctoral training at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the FDA, where she studied pathogen reduction technologies for blood transfusion units. In 2020, Dr. Gough returned to NIAID to undergo further postdoctoral training with Dr. Ian Myles in the Epithelial Therapeutics Unit, where she began her mechanistic studies of R. mucosa. Dr. Gough received an Independent Research Scholar award in 2022 and formed her own research group to expand her studies of R. mucosa.
