Tor Savidge

Tor Savidge is a Professor at the Baylor College of Medicine in the Department of Pathology & Immunology. His research focuses on neuroimmune-microbial interactions in the gastrointestinal tract, utilizing advanced techniques such as computational biology, metabolomics, and humanized disease models.

• Academic Rank: Professor
• University: Baylor College of Medicine
• Department: Pathology & Immunology

Dr. Savidge's research has uncovered critical roles for gut astrocytes in regulating mucosal barrier function and inflammation in diseases like Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), necrotizing enterocolitis, and Clostridium difficile infection. His team identified a novel innate host defense mechanism against microbial toxins, which is being developed into allosteric therapeutics for gastrointestinal diseases.

His recent publications highlight work on C. difficile toxin B enzymatic activities, enterotoxigenic E. coli toxin variants, and nitric oxide synthase inhibition in colitis models. Dr. Savidge leads NIH-funded projects on novel CDI therapeutics and collaborates with the Texas Children's Microbiome Center to advance metabolomics-based diagnostics for functional bowel disorders.

Research Grants:

• R01 NIAID AI10094001 (2012-2017): Allosteric therapy of C. difficile toxins
• R21 DK096323-01 (2014-2015): Metabolomics biomarkers in CDI

Lab Members:

• Numan Oezguen (Assistant Professor)
• Jennifer K Spinler (Instructor)
• Mary Elizabeth Tessier (Assistant Professor)