CJ Anderson

Wellcome Trust Career Development Award Fellow

  • Centre for Inflammation Research
  • Institute for Regeneration and Repair

Contact details

Address

Street

Institute for Regeneration and Repair
4-5 Little France Drive

City
Edinburgh
Post code
EH16 4UU

Availability

  • Monday-Friday 8am-6pm

Biography

Background

I graduated with a BS in Biology from the University of Wisconsin (USA) in 2011. From there, I spent the next 2 years in a clinical microbiology and infectious disease research laboratory that focused on molecular diagnostics for bloodstream, urinary tract, and intestinal tract infections. I returned to academia and completed my PhD in microbiology (2013-2017) in the lab of Professor Melissa Kendall at the University of Virginia (USA) studying bacterial signal transduction networks during host adaptation. I was awarded membership to the Raven Society and received the MIC Outstanding Student Award. After my PhD, I was awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Belgian government to work with Professor Kodi Ravichandran at the VIB-UGent Center for Inflammation Research (2018-2023). There, my work identified a novel relationship in which intestinal microbes exploit the soluble factors released by dying mammalian cells. In October 2022, I was awarded the Chancellor’s Fellowship and subsequently the Wellcome Trust Career Development Award to establish my own lab within the CIR.

Qualifications

PhD (Microbiology), University of Virginia School of Medicine (2017)

BS (Biology), University of Wisconsin (2011)

Responsibilities & affiliations

Wellcome Trust Discovery Advisory Group: Immune System in Health and Disease (2024-2027)

mBio Early Career Editorial Board (2024-2026)

Open to PhD supervision enquiries?

Yes

Current PhD students supervised

Anna Davey

Research summary

We study how gut microbes interact with dying intestinal cells and explore what drives infections and microbial imbalances in the gut, aiming to develop new treatments that prevent infections and reduce intestinal damage.

Current research interests

Our lab studies how gut microbes interact with dying intestinal cells during injury and repair. We explore what drives infections and microbial imbalances in the gut, with the goal of developing therapeutic approaches that reduce susceptibility to infection and limit associated intestinal injury. Using bacterial genetics and mouse models of infection, we can better understand inflammatory diseases and responses to chemotherapy. My lab uses both host and microbe-centric approaches to identify the critical points of communication between intestinal bacterial and mammalian epithelial cells. We combine bacterial RNA sequencing with unbiased metabolomic profiling of host cell supernatants in our in vitro and ex vivo reductionist approaches to identify candidate pathways/molecules of interest. From there, we harness the power of bacterial genetics and apply our findings to in vivo models of murine infection, inflammatory disorders, and chemotherapy treatment. Experimental toolbox: bacterial genetics, RNA sequencing/qPCR, metatranscriptomics, metabolomics, mammalian cell culture, mammalian genetics, microscopy, flow cytometry, mouse models.

Affiliated research centres

Current project grants

Wellcome Trust Career Development Award (2023-2031). "Cell death facilitates host-microbe communication in the insulted intestine" Sole Investigator
Bowel Research UK Microbiome Project Round (2025-2027). “Dysbiosis driven delays to intestinal regeneration and repair” Lead Investigator
Ker-Memorial PhD Studentship (awarded to Anna Davey, 2023-2027)

Past project grants

Young Investigator Proof-of-Concept Grant (2021-2023). Cancer Research Institute Gent (Belgium).
Postdoctoral Fellowship (2020-2023). Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (Belgium).
Robert R Wagner Fellowship (2016-2017). University of Virginia (USA).
T32 Infectious Disease Training Grant (2014-2016). NIH (USA).

Invited speaker

CRUK Scotland Institute in Glasgow. Workshop: Lessons from the microbes within us; developing the next generation immunotherapeutics. Glasgow, UK. October 2025.

British Society for Immunology. BSI Congress 2023. Belfast, UK. December 2023.

Edinburgh Infectious Diseases. 12th Annual Symposium. Edinburgh, UK. June 2023.

Gent Gut Inflammation Group (GGIG). Semi-Annual Meeting. Gent, Belgium. Gent, Belgium. February 2023.

EMBO.  ‘Phagocytosis of dying cells: molecules, mechanisms, and therapeutic implications.’ Gent, Belgium. September 2022.

American Society for Microbiology. ‘ASM Microbe’ General Meeting. Washington, DC (USA). June 2022.

Gent Gut Inflammation Group (GGIG). Semi-Annual Meeting. Gent, Belgium. September 2021.

American Physiological Society. Annual Meeting on Experimental Biology. Chicago, IL (USA). April 2017.

American Society for Microbiology. General Meeting. New Orleans, LA (USA). June 2015.

Organiser

Cell Death UK 2025. CRUK Scotland Institute. Glasgow, UK. October 6 2025. Co-organiser.

Participant

Gordon Research Conference. Microbial Toxins and Pathogenicity 2024.

Gordon Research Conference. Salmonella Biology and Pathogenesis 2023.

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