{"id":3613,"date":"2024-03-26T12:15:49","date_gmt":"2024-03-26T16:15:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/?page_id=3613"},"modified":"2025-04-24T13:50:50","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T17:50:50","slug":"smeekens-lab","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/lab\/smeekens-lab\/","title":{"rendered":"Smeekens Lab"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 class=\"section-som\"><span>Johanna Smeekens, PhD<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/people\/johanna-smeekens-phd\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-3676  alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1402\/2024\/05\/Johanna-Smeekens-Blue-Background-1-264x300.png\" alt=\"Johanna Smeekens\" width=\"158\" height=\"180\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1402\/2024\/05\/Johanna-Smeekens-Blue-Background-1-264x300.png 264w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1402\/2024\/05\/Johanna-Smeekens-Blue-Background-1.png 330w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 158px) 100vw, 158px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Johanna Smeekens, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology. She received her Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Michigan State University in 2012, and her PhD in Chemistry from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2017. After, she completed her Postdoctoral training with Drs. Mike Kulis and Wesley Burks in the UNC Food Allergy Initiative, where her research focused on developing novel animal models of food sensitization and implementing those models to test therapeutic approaches for food allergy. She has been an Assistant Professor at UNC since 2021.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"section-som\"><span>Research Interests<\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Our research focuses on investigating factors that contribute to the development of food allergy, with an emphasis on how we can manipulate these factors towards preventative and therapeutic strategies. Specifically, we aim to understand the role of environmental exposures, particularly early in life, in non-oral sensitization to foods that lead to allergy. We are also especially interested in testing novel therapeutics for food allergy that can induce tolerance, after allergy is already established. We utilize a combination of human samples and mouse models to address these goals.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"section-som\"><span>Lab Personnel<\/span><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/toxicology\/directory\/jess-humphrey\/\">Jess Humphrey<\/a>, Graduate student in CiTEM<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<a class=\"btn btn-primary btn-lg btn-block  oscitas-bootstrap-container\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/?term=Smeekens+JM&amp;sort=pubdate\">Click here for a list of publications<\/a>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Johanna Smeekens, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology. She received her Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Michigan State University in 2012, and her PhD in Chemistry from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2017. After, she completed her Postdoctoral training with Drs. Mike Kulis and Wesley Burks &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/lab\/smeekens-lab\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Smeekens Lab\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20847,"featured_media":0,"parent":2288,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"layout":"","cellInformation":"","apiCallInformation":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-3613","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","odd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Smeekens Lab - UNC Food Allergy Initiative<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/pediatrics\/foodallergy\/lab\/smeekens-lab\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Smeekens Lab - UNC Food Allergy Initiative\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Johanna Smeekens, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology. She received her Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Michigan State University in 2012, and her PhD in Chemistry from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2017. After, she completed her Postdoctoral training with Drs. 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