Caitlin Kowalski, PhD, a microbiologist in the department of dermatology at Dartmouth Health’s Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, has been awarded a New Innovator Award from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The five-year, $1.5 million dollar award will support her research into how fungi living on the skin contribute to atopic dermatitis. It is given to early-career investigators pursuing especially creative, high-risk, high-reward research.
Atopic dermatitis is the most common chronic inflammatory skin disease, affecting more than 16 million adults in the U.S. It causes intensely itchy, painful, dry skin, and its onset, severity, and response to treatment are notoriously hard to predict.
Kowalski’s research centers on the skin mycobiome – the community of fungi that live on the skin. While the role of bacteria in the skin microbiome has been studied intensively, the functional role of fungi remains poorly understood.
Her project will focus on head and neck atopic dermatitis, a subtype affecting more than a third of adult patients that is often resistant to standard biologic treatments. Kowalski will investigate how changes in the skin environment affect fungal communities and how those fungi interact with other microbes and skin cells.
The research aims to identify potential therapeutic targets and strategies for improving treatment and quality of life for people with atopic dermatitis.
Kowalski’s project, “Uncovering the Functional Role of the Skin Mycobiome in Atopic Dermatitis,” has a project period of Aug. 11, 2026 to July 31, 2031.
About Dartmouth Health
Dartmouth Health, New Hampshire’s only academic health system and largest private employer, serves patients across New England. Dartmouth Health provides access to more than 2,300 providers in nearly every area of medicine, delivering care at its flagship hospital, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) in Lebanon, NH. Its network of hospitals, outpatient centers, clinics and home care facilities, spans a broad geographical area. Year after year, DHMC is named the #1 hospital in New Hampshire by U.S. News & World Report, and is consistently recognized for high performance in numerous clinical specialties and procedures. Dartmouth Health includes Dartmouth Cancer Center, northern New England’s only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers and one of less than than 60 total nationally; Dartmouth Health Children’s, which includes the state’s only children’s hospital (Children’s Hospital at DHMC/CHaD) and more than 20 locations around the region; eight member hospitals in Lebanon, Keene, Claremont, Hampstead, and New London, NH, and Windsor and Bennington, VT; Dartmouth Health Home Care; Dartmouth Health Connected Care Center for Telehealth, serving patients as far away as Texas; and more than 30 primary and multi-specialty clinics across New Hampshire and Vermont. Through its partnership with Dartmouth College, Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine and the White River Junction VA Medical Center, Dartmouth Health trains nearly 400 medical residents and fellows annually and performs cutting-edge research and clinical trials with international impact. Dartmouth Health and its more than 16,000 employees are committed to serving the healthcare needs of everyone in the communities it serves and to providing every patient with exceptional, state-of-the-art, personalized care. Learn more at dartmouth-health.org.