Dr. Dilani Braziunas Senadheera, Ph.D.

My research focus is to use oral microbiomics to examine bacterial shifts during conditions that compromise oral and systemic health (for example, hyposalivation, diabetes, obesity, etc.). My research aims to answer two questions: 1) How do bacterial communities in the human body shift during health and disease states? 2) How can knowledge of health- and disease-associated microbiota be used for our benefit with translational applications? Using next-generation DNA sequencing, bioinformatics, machine learning, and molecular microbiological methods, my goal is to discover oral bacterial biomarkers to facilitate the development of novel aids for infection risk prediction, diagnostics, prognostics and therapeutics. 

Another focus of my research is to break new ground in oral medicine and develop a next-generation artificial mouth model for in vitro surveillance and manipulation of oral plaque suspensions. My vision is to use this model for novel drug testing and to examine the possibility to restore the function of a dysbiotic community with health-associated beneficial microbiota using defined probiotics or whole-plaque bacterial therapy (i.e. plaque transplantation).