Klas Udekwu

Klas Udekwu serves as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences within the University of Idaho's College of Science, conducting interdisciplinary research at the nexus of microbiology and mathematical modeling. His work addresses critical challenges in antibiotic resistance dynamics, microbiome functionality, and pathogen transmission in urban environments.

He earned his PhD in Molecular Microbiology (2007) and MSc in Molecular Biology (2002) from Uppsala Universitet, establishing foundational expertise in bacterial molecular mechanisms. His academic journey reflects a strategic integration of experimental microbiology with quantitative approaches.

Dr. Udekwu's research program emphasizes antibiotic resistance modeling, gut microbiome dynamics in metabolic diseases, and urban aerobiome characterization. He investigates how mathematical frameworks can predict treatment failure in antibiotic cycling while examining specific bacterial associations (e.g., Phocaeicola vulgatus) with diabetic complications. His work on public transit aerobiomes reveals geographical resistance patterns through the MetaSUB consortium.

Analysis of his 15 most recent publications (2022-2025) demonstrates three converging themes: computational platforms for antibiotic therapy optimization, microbiome-functional impairment linkages in type 2 diabetes, and global urban microbiome mapping. These studies consistently integrate wet-lab microbiology with mathematical modeling to address antimicrobial resistance from ecological and clinical perspectives.

He co-directs the Marx-Udekwu Joint Lab, which functions as an interdisciplinary hub for collaborative research where experimental microbiology interfaces with dynamical systems theory. The lab's work on invariant set theory for antibiotic cycling represents a novel mathematical approach to treatment protocol design.