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Dr. Daniel Johnston

Assistant Professor (Anatomy)
BIOMEDICAL SCIENCES INSTITUTE
      
Profile Photo

Dr. Daniel Johnston

Assistant Professor (Anatomy)
BIOMEDICAL SCIENCES INSTITUTE

 

 3531896 1353


Daniel received his B.A. (Mod) and PhD in Immunology from Trinity College Dublin, studying molecular mediators of inflammatory bowel disease and bacterial infection. Upon completion of this work, he moved to the University of Oxford to carry out postdoctoral research in host-microbe interactions and macrophage function at the Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology where he held the Bryan Warren Junior Research Fellowship at Linacre College Oxford. He then returned to Ireland to take up an AbbVie Newman Fellowship in the Charles Institute of Dermatology. Here he investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying inflammatory skin disease. During this time, he became a Fulbright Scholar and worked at Harvard University employing novel single cell methodologies in his dermatological research. In 2022, he returned to the Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute upon his faculty appointment as Assistant Professor in the Discipline of Anatomy, School of Medicine, TCD. Daniel's current research focuses on the underlying mechanisms that govern inflammatory diseases of barrier tissues. In particular, he is interested in understanding hidradenitis suppurativa, a debilitating and understudied inflammatory skin disorder.
Project Title
 Functional analysis of inflammasome protein mutations n the inflammatory skin disease hidradenitis suppurativa
From
01/02/2023
To
01/02/2024
Summary
Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a common and debilitating inflammatory skin disease with a prevalence between 1 and 4%. The aetiology of HS is poorly understood, and treatment options are limited 1 . Only 50% of patients respond to anti-TNF" biologics treatment, the current best-in-class therapy for the disease. Further research into the pathophysiology of HS is required in order to create more optimized and personalized treatment options. Combining the disciplines of human genetics, immunology and dermatology offers promise in the pursuit of this goal. One promising avenue of investigation towards understanding disease biology is the role of inflammasomes in HS. Inflammasomes are multiprotein complexes that play a central role in innate immunity. Inflammasome activation is crucial for host defense to pathogens, but overactivation has been reported in HS at the molecular level, but the reasons for this are unclear. Numerous case reports demonstrate that HS is a component of PAPA syndrome and a recent large epidemiological study found that HS is associated with Mediterranean Fever (MF), both implicating the pyrin inflammasome. This project aims this project is to functionally characterize these mutations using precise and sophisticated in vitro cell culture systems. This will help to uncover relevant disease biology, which will implicate cells and molecules in HS pathogenesis, and potentially point towards druggable pathways in this poorly studied condition.
Funding Agency
City of Dublin Skin and Cancer Hospital Charity
Project Type
PDRA
Project Title
 Rational design of 3D organotypic in vitro models of the inflammatory skin disease Hidradenitis Suppuarativa
From
10/03/2023
To
Summary
Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a chronic skin disease which dramatically lessens patient quality of life and affects over 1% of Irish people. Sufferers of HS experience inflammation in areas where skin rubs together (e.g. under the arms) which is associated with painful boils which flare and burst, and ultimately scar. These symptoms lead to embarrassment and social exclusion that is psychologically devastating. Little is known about the causes of HS and there is only a single licensed treatment for the disease. A major obstacle in understanding HS and designing new treatments is the lack of an effective disease model for use by researchers. The goal of this project is to begin developing such a model for use in a controlled laboratory setting, reducing reliance on patient biopsies which are painful and invasive for patient donors and scarce and limiting for researchers. We propose to establish a skin cell culture system which we can modify to accurately model HS. We will use data obtained from our previous work to modify the system, skewing the skin cells to closely resemble those in HS. This project will allow for a larger study to further develop our model to understand and treat this disease.
Funding Agency
Enterprise Ireland
Programme
ERC Support Grant
Project Title
 Rational design of 3D organotypic in vitro models of the inflammatory skin disease hidradenitis suppurativa towards a high risk, high reward application for an ERC Starting Grant.
From
05/04/2023
To
04/04/2024
Summary
Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a chronic skin disease which dramatically lessens patient quality of life and affects over 1% of Irish people. Sufferers of HS experience inflammation in areas where skin rubs together (e.g. under the arms) which is associated with painful boils which flare and burst, and ultimately scar. These symptoms lead to embarrassment and social exclusion that is psychologically devastating. Little is known about the causes of HS and there is only a single licensed treatment for the disease. A major obstacle in understanding HS and designing new treatments is the lack of an effective disease model for use by researchers. The goal of this project is to begin developing such a model for use in a controlled laboratory setting, reducing reliance on patient biopsies which are painful and invasive for patient donors and scarce and limiting for researchers. We propose to establish a skin cell culture system which we can modify to accurately model HS. We will use data obtained from our previous work to modify the system, skewing the skin cells to closely resemble those in HS. This project will allow for a larger study to further develop our model to understand and treat this disease.
Funding Agency
TCD
Programme
TCD MED Awards
Project Type
Seed Funding
Project Title
 Developing an e-learning platform to retain the extraordinary educational value of our annually donated human brains and promote their clinical value through radiological integration.
From
To
Summary
Funding Agency
TCD
Programme
Dean"s Award for Innovation in Teaching 2022-23

Details Date
Immunotherapy Advances Early Career Editorial Board Member 01 August
Irish Representative to the Young European Federation of Immunological Sciences 2020
Consultancy: Curie.Bio VC, Boston, MA, USA 1st June
Details Date From Date To
Anatomical Society 2022
Irish Society for Immunology 2011
British Society for Immunology, Oxford, GB 2017
O'Donohoe, S and Leahy, C and Johnston, DGW and Tobin, DJ, ANALYSIS OF INFLAMMASOME PROTEIN EXPRESSION IN HIDRADENITIS SUPPURATIVA PATIENT TISSUE, IRISH JOURNAL OF MEDICAL SCIENCE, 191, (SUPPL 1), 2022, ppS13--S14 , Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Buruno, H and Johnston, D and Tobin, D, Can the collapse of the human scalp hair follicle pigmentary unit with age (canities) provide insight into how melanocyte death could be induced in melanoma?, BRITISH JOURNAL OF DERMATOLOGY, 187, (1), 2022, ppE37--E37 , Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Johnston, DGW and Hambly, R and Kearney, N and Tobin, DJ and Kirby, B, A preliminary study of soluble CD14 levels in the serum of patients with hidradenitis suppurativa as a marker of ?leaky gut? [version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review], HRB Open Research, 5, (68), 2022, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
Johnston, Daniel G. W., Hambly, Roisin, Kearney, Niamh, Tobin, Desmond J., Kirby, Brian, Cell"free DNA is elevated in the serum of patients with hidradenitis suppurativa, The Journal of Dermatology, 2022, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
H Buruno, D Johnston, D Tobin, Can the collapse of the human scalp hair follicle pigmentary unit with age (canities) provide insight into how melanocyte death could be induced in melanoma?, British Journal of Dermatology, British Association of Dermatologists 102nd Annual Meeting, Glasgow, UK, 05"07 July 2022, 187, (S1), Wiley, 2022, ppE37 - E37, Poster, PUBLISHED  URL  URL
Buruno, H and Johnston, D and Tobin, DJ, CAN THE COLLAPSE OF THE SCALP HAIR FOLLICLE PIGMENTARY UNIT WITH AGE (CANITIES) PROVIDE INSIGHTS INTO HOW MELANOCYTE DEATH COULD BE INDUCED IN MELANOMA?, IRISH JOURNAL OF MEDICAL SCIENCE, 190, (SUPPL 4), 2021, ppS121--S122 , Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Immunotherapy Advances, Oxford University Press, [eds.], 2021-2027, Editorial Board, PUBLISHED
Daniel G.W. Johnston, Brian Kirby, Desmond J. Tobin, Hidradenitis suppurativa: A folliculotropic disease of innate immune barrier dysfunction?, Experimental Dermatology, 2021, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
Hackett, E.E., Charles-Messance, H., O'Leary, S.M., Gleeson, L.E., Muñoz-Wolf, N., Case, S., Wedderburn, A., Johnston, D.G.W., Williams, M.A., Smyth, A., Ouimet, M., Moore, K.J., Lavelle, E.C., Corr, S.C., Gordon, S.V., Keane, J., Sheedy, F.J., Mycobacterium tuberculosis Limits Host Glycolysis and IL-1ß by Restriction of PFK-M via MicroRNA-21, Cell Reports, 30, (1), 2020, p124-136.e4 , Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  DOI
Daniel Johnston, Alfred I. Tauber, Immunity: The Evolution of an Idea (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 328 pages. ISBN: 9780190651244. Hardcover: $78.00, Paperback $39.95., Politics and the Life Sciences, 38, (1), 2019, p103--105 , Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
  

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Award Date
Trinity Research Doctoral Award 2023
TCD MED Award 2023
HRB Health Impact Fulbright Scholarship 2022
Visiting Assistant Professorship, UCD Charles Insitute of Dermatology 2022
UCD Career Development Fellowship 2020
AbbVie Newman Fellowship in Dermatology 2020
Bryan Warren Junior Research Fellowship, Linacre College, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom 2017
My research interests lie at the barrier sites of the human body, most notably the skin and gut, where we interact with our external environment. His work focuses on molecular mechanisms that govern our immune system's interaction with the external agencies (such as the microbiome), and the diseases that result in the breakdown of these mechanisms. In particular, he is interested in: 1. The effect of microbial metabolites on innate immune cell function. 2. Aberrant immune function in inflammatory diseases of the gut (e.g. inflammatory bowel diseases or IBD) and the skin (e.g. hidradenitis suppurativa [HS] and psoriasis). To date, his work has been supported by a Trinity Research Doctoral Award, Enterprise Ireland, The City of Dublin Skin and Cancer Hospital Charity, The Health Research Board, the Fulbright Commission, UCD Foundation and the British Skin Foundation among others. Currently active projects include: A. An investigation in to the functional characterisation of newly discovered inflammasome mutations in HS patients (a collaboration with Dr Lynn Petukhova, Columbia University, USA) supported by The City of Dublin Skin and Cancer Hospital Charity and the British Skin Foundation. B. A Trinity Research Doctoral Award seeking to use in vitro and ex vivo models to understand HS pathogenesis, with a focus on the early events causing hair follicle breakdown and occlusion.