Duke School of Medicine has announced the launch of a four-year, USD 3.2 million research effort aimed at developing and using a 3D-printed living lung model to better understand how influenza interacts with bacteria in the human respiratory system.
The project is supported by a grant from the US National Institutes of Health and is co-led by Julia Oh, PhD, a microbiologist and professor of integrative immunobiology at Duke School of Medicine, and Ibrahim Ozbolat, PhD, a professor at Penn State.
According to Duke, the research will focus on why certain combinations of influenza viruses and bacteria in the lungs lead to more severe illness, including pneumonia, while others do not.
It noted that each year, influenza infects millions of people globally, and secondary bacterial infections are a major driver of serious complications.
Despite this, Duke said scientists still lack a clear understanding of how different microbes interact with the virus inside human lung tissue.
“Researchers have long studied the flu virus’s effects on the lungs, but we don’t know how adding diverse bacterial strains changes the outcome,” Oh said. “The respiratory microbiome varies widely between people, and we’ve lacked models that reflect that complexity.”
To address this gap, the researchers will use a 3D-bioprinted lung model developed in Ozbolat’s laboratory at Penn State.
The model is made from stem cell–derived lung cells and designed to replicate key features of human lung function, including ventilation. This allows scientists to introduce influenza viruses and specific bacteria and observe how infections develop over time in a controlled environment.
“The precision of bioprinting lets us recreate miniature, breathing lung sacs that behave like native tissue,” Ozbolat said.
“This is the first time a dynamic 3D lung model will be used to study virus–bacteria interactions.” Under the collaboration, Ozbolat’s team will fabricate the lung tissues, while Oh’s group at Duke will conduct infection experiments using influenza and selected microbes.
Duke said the teams will combine multiomics approaches with advanced imaging to analyse how co-infections affect immune responses.
The aim is to identify why some bacterial partners worsen influenza outcomes while others may help prime protective immune defences.
The researchers noted that the work is intended to provide insight rather than immediate clinical solutions.
Given the global burden of influenza, the researchers said the findings could eventually inform future vaccine design and therapeutic strategies.
They also highlighted that the 3D-printed lung platform may offer a new way to study respiratory diseases without relying on animal models or intentional human infections. The project includes collaborators from the Jackson Laboratory and Nationwide Children’s Hospital.
