Robert Tighe Email & Phone Number

I am an Associate Professor of Medicine with tenure and Vice-Chief for Research in the Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Medicine at Duke University and a Staff Physician at the Durham VA. I am a physician-scientist with clinical expertise in the diagnosis and management of patients with Interstitial Lung Disease. The research focus of my laboratory is to identify susceptibility factors and candidate pathways relevant to host biological responses to air pollutants and other toxicants. By carefully dissecting these links, we gain insight into how environmental pollutants acutely induce respiratory symptoms and exacerbate chronic lung diseases. This can lead to targeted therapeutics and/or identify susceptible populations. My research program is fully translational from cells, to genetically modified rodents and human exposure studies. In particular, we are interested in lung epithelial cells and macrophage crosstalk in lung injury and the impact of air pollution. To support this research, my laboratory has established expertise performance of in vitro and in vivo exposures to a variety of toxicants. This includes studies with ozone, wood smoke particulate matter, bleomycin and silica. I also have expertise in lung immune cell profiling (e.g. flow cytometry, and single cell RNA sequencing) and development of air-liquid interface cultures from mice and humans. I am also involved in human clinical studies using advanced imaging to assess disease activity and response to therapies in people with pulmonary fibrosis.

Listed skills include Medical Education, Internal Medicine, Medicine, Medical Research, and 10 others.