Minerva Garcia

Minerva Garcia Martin – PhD Student 

My PhD aims to develop a novel method to investigate the interactions between epithelial cells, lung fibroblast and immune cells, and assess how different environmental stimuli contribute to tissue damage. After the completion of a BSc in Biotechnology from the University of Barcelona, I moved to London to pursue my MSc in Immunology at Imperial College London and joined the NHLI. For my MSc thesis in the Harker lab, I investigated the effect of dendritic cells in T follicular helper cells dysregulation during early life.

Following my MSc, I worked for seven months as a Research Technician in the Johansson’s lab (Imperial College London), where we examined the type I interferon response in various COVID-19 mouse models. In 2022, I joined Professor Lloyd’s group as a Research Technician, where my work focused on investigating immune-neuro-stromal interactions in asthma, along with providing support for several ongoing projects. My growing interest in lung cell communication led to the development of a new project that focused on lung crosstalk in a 3D environment. In 2023, this project evolved into my PhD in Clinical Medicine Research.

minerva.garcia-martin20@imperial.ac.uk 

@a_minervagm21

0000-0001-6679-6177

Publications

  • Mincham, K. T., Loewenthal, L. E., Meyer, G. F., Fontanella, S., Marfia, M., Martin, M. G., … & Snelgrove, R. J. (2025). Severe asthma is characterized by a sex-specific ILC landscape and aberrant airway profile that is suppressed by anti–IL-5/5Rα biologics. Science Translational Medicine, 17(818), eadu4913.
  • Puttur, F., Traves, W. J., Martin, M. G., Di Carmine, S., Fercoq, F., Gaboriau, D. C., … & Lloyd, C. M. (2025). Epithelial cell-derived lumican modulates extracellular matrix dynamics in early-life airways disease. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
  • Guan, S. Y., Ogger, P. P., Farias, A., Garcia Martín, M., Nakawesi, J., Bedard, O., … & Johansson, C. (2025). Sustained Lung Inflammation Post‐SARS‐CoV‐2 Infection in Mice Is Associated with Increased Pulmonary T Cells. European journal of immunology, 55(8), e70043.
  • Ogger PP, Martín MG, Jang S, Zhou J, Brown J, Sukhova K, Furnon W, Patel AH, Cowton V, Palmarini M, Barclay WS, Johansson C. SARS-CoV-2 strains bearing Omicron BA.1 spike replicate in C57BL/6 mice. Front Immunol. 2024 Apr 29;15:1383612. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2024.1383612. PMID: 38742107; PMCID: PMC11089223.
  • Joulia R, Puttur F, Stölting H, Traves WJ, Entwistle LJ, Voitovich A, Garcia Martín M, Al-Sahaf M, Bonner K, Scotney E, Molyneaux PL, Hewitt RJ, Walker SA, Yates L, Saglani S, Lloyd CM. Mast cell activation disrupts interactions between endothelial cells and pericytes during early life allergic asthma. J Clin Invest. 2024 Mar 15;134(6):e173676. doi: 10.1172/JCI173676. PMID: 38487999; PMCID: PMC10940085.
  • Ogger P.P., Garcia Martín M., Michalaki C., Zhou J., Brown J. C., Du Y., Miah K. M., Habib O., Hyde S.C., Gill D. R., Barclay W. S., Johansson C. Type I interferon signaling deficiency results in dysregulated innate immune responses to SARS-CoV-2 in a mouse model. European Journal of Immunology. https://doi.org/10.1002/eji.202249913