The broader research focus of the Badovinac lab is to understand the mechanisms that govern the CD4 and CD8 T cell responses to infection and immunization. The emphasis is on exploring the pathways that are involved in antigen specific T cell homeostasis in vivo, and understanding how the manipulation of these pathways can be used to facilitate the generation and maintenance of productive memory T cell responses in health and disease, using mouse model systems and human samples.

My research here is specifically geared towards understanding CD4 T cell mediated immune regulation during total body irradiation and sepsis induced Immune dysfunction using mouse models.

Publications

1. Kannan SK, Heidarian M, Escue EA, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. Virus-specific memory CD4+ T cells sustain long-term numerical and functional impairment following whole-body irradiation. J Immunol 215(9):vkag224 (2026). Article| PMID: 42722349
2. Kannan SK, Turner TJ, Heidarian M, Mix MR, Kim CY, Fain CE, Shahi SK, Escue EA, Ezeilo I, Griffith TS, Mangalam AK, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. Whole-body irradiation leads to long-term impairment in the maintenance and function of self- and non-self-epitope-specific naïve CD4⁺ T cells. J Immunol 215(7):vkag174 (2026). Article | PMID: 42441427
3. Mix MR, Sievers CM, Hassert MA, Kannan SK, Pewe LL, Huang SC, He R, Fain CE, Heidarian M, Hancox LS, Arumugam SA, Beltz TG, Jin F, Johnson AJ, Carter CS, Butler N, Salem AK, Badovinac VP, Harty JT. Peripheral vaccination-induced brain-resident memory CD8⁺ T cells provide durable protection against intracranial malignancy. J Clin Invest 136(8):e197812 (2026). Article | PMID: 41983390
4. Escue EA, Heidarian M, Kannan SK, Rao M, Arumugam S, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. The ability of memory CD8⁺ T cell subsets to numerically and functionally recover following whole-body irradiation is influenced by their history of cognate antigen exposures. J Immunol 214(10):2617–2629 (2025). Article | PMID: 40854546 | AAI News & Views, September 3, 2025.
5. Heidarian M, Kannan SK, Swanson W, Griffith TS, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. Delineating the short- and long-term impact of ionizing radiation on antigen-inexperienced CD8⁺ T cell subsets. JCI Insight 10(18):e194201 (2025). Article | PMID: 40762983
6. Mix MR, Berton RR, Kreitlow BL, Xu J, Van de Wall S, Epping LL, Hancox LS, Fain CE, Hassert MA, Kannan SK, Arumugam SA, Sievers CM, Buchanan GF, Griffith TS, Badovinac VP, Harty JT. Physiologic microbial exposure normalizes memory T cell surveillance of the brain and modifies host seizure outcomes. Nat Immunol 26(7):1087–1098 (2025). Article| PMID: 40514419 | News & Views – Murphy MK, and T Egawa. Nat Immunol 27: 1532-1533.
7. Berton RR*, Heidarian M*, Kannan SK*, Shah M, Butler NS, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. Accurate enumeration of pathogen-specific and virtual memory CD8⁺ T cells after infection. J Immunol 214(5):995–1007 (2025). Article | PMID: 40167212 | *equal contribution
8. Kim CY, Kannan SK, Badovinac VP, Griffith TS. Protocol for inducing monomicrobial sepsis in mice with uropathogenic E. coli. STAR Protoc 5(3):103206 (2024). Article | PMID: 39068653
9. Kannan SK, Kim CY, Heidarian M, Berton RR, Jensen IJ, Griffith TS, Badovinac VP. Mouse models of sepsis. Curr Protoc 4(3):e997 (2024). Article | PMID: 38439603 | Current Protocols Top-10 most cited article published in 2024.
10. Heidarian M, Jensen IJ, Kannan SK, Pewe LL, Hassert M, Park SR, Xue HH, Harty JT, Badovinac VP. Sublethal whole-body irradiation induces permanent loss and dysfunction in pathogen-specific circulating memory CD8⁺ T cell populations. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 120(27):e2302785120 (2023). Article | PMID: 37364124

Honors and Awards

Ballard & Seashore Dissertation Fellowship (Spring 2026)
Graduate College Post-Comprehensive Exam Research Fellowship (2023)
AAI Young Investigator Award at the Autumn Immunology Conference (2023)