ASCI / Young Physician-Scientist Awards, 2024

Drew Schwartz, MD, PhD is a physician-scientist and Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Infectious Diseases at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. He completed his undergraduate training at Duke University with a double major in Chemistry and Biology. He then completed training through the Medical Scientist Training Program at Washington University School of Medicine. His PhD in the laboratory of Scott Hultgren, PhD focused on the molecular mechanisms by which uropathogenic E. coli take advantage of the host bladder epithelium and immune response to cause severe urinary tract infection. He completed pediatric residency and infectious disease fellowship at Washington University School of Medicine. He joined the lab of Gautam Dantas, PhD for his fellowship research, funded by the Pediatric Infectious Disease Society and St. Jude Children's Hospital Fellowship in Basic and Translational Research where he studied the role of the gut microbiome and antibiotic resistance in serious infections. Dr. Schwartz's laboratory currently utilizes gut microbiome culturing and sequencing, immune profiling, and computational analyses in clinical cohorts and mechanistic, gnotobiotic animal models to investigate how the pediatric gut microbiome and immune response develop and are disrupted leading to serious bacterial infections. His goal is to utilize predictive computational algorithms and gut microbiome profiling to better identify children at risk of sepsis and provide personalized antibiotic recommendations and stewardship. He has funding from a Thrasher Research Fund Early Career Award, a Doris Duke Foundation Physician Scientist Fellowship and an NIH NIAID K08 award. In his spare time, he enjoys board games and mountain and road cycling.