Dr. Özlem Yilmaz Research Lab
At Medical University of South Carolina
Dr. Bridgette Wellslager, PhD
Bridgette Wellslager is a Post-Doctoral Fellow who is currently working at the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland. She was accepted into the PhD program for Biomedical Sciences at the Medical University of South Carolina in 2018. She then joined Dr. Özlem Yilmaz’s laboratory as a PhD student in the Department of Oral Health Sciences and was the recipient of the T32 Training Grant. She was also a recipient of an NIH F31 scholarship. While in the Yilmaz lab, Bridgette studied the key molecular mechanisms that oral pathogens use to ensure persistent survival in human mucosal cells. In particular, she studied the selective autophagy mechanisms of opportunistic pathogens in host epithelial cells and other host tissues.
Since starting at the NIH, Bridgette has become an established member of the Webster-Cyriaque lab in NIAID. She has been examining how poor periodontal health might influence the severity and outcomes of infections with viral agents, such as HPV.
Bridgette is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the NIH with NIAID. She is mostly examining host-pathogen interactions in the oral mucosa.
