The Fiebiger Laboratory is located in the division of GI/Nutrition in the Enders Research Building at Boston Children’s Hospital. Our lab is a part of the Harvard Digestive Disease Center, a larger consortium of talented interdisciplinary investigators that focus on gastrointestinal research.
The focus of research in Fiebiger Lab is antigen presentation. Antigen presentation is a central event for the initiation of adaptive immune responses. The broad scope of the Fiebiger Lab is to study mechanisms of exogenous antigen presentation in the context of gastrointestinal immune responses. Our approach is to complement in vivo studies using transgenic animal models with cell-based in vitro experiments to elucidate the consequences of antigen presentation for intestinal homeostasis and inflammation. Main areas of interest are oral tolerance as well as the pathology of food allergic reactions. Our goal is to understand how inflammatory Th2 responses in the gut are initiated and regulated by dendritic cells and IgE receptors. Additionally, we are studying functions of the IgE protein network beyond the scope of allergic reaction. This topic touches the nascent field of allergo-oncology as well as IgE-mediated immunity in inflammatory bowel disease.
