Sara Cherry

Sara R. Cherry is an American microbiologist who is a Professor of Microbiology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research involves genetic and mechanistic studies of virus–host interactions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Cherry looked to identify novel therapeutic strategies.

Sara R. Cherry
Alma materMassachusetts Institute of Technology (PhD)
University of California, Berkeley (BS)
Scientific career
InstitutionsUniversity of Pennsylvania
Harvard Medical School
ThesisThe regulation of V(D)J recombination (1999)
Doctoral advisorDavid Baltimore
InfluencesPeter G. Schultz
Norbert Perrimon

Early life and education

Cherry grew up in Brooklyn.[1] Her mother was born in Germany in a displaced persons camp and migrated to the United States. Her father was from Poland and passed through Ellis Island.[1] Her parents were the first in their families to attend college and eventually became academics at Brooklyn College.[1] Her mother was eventually made Head of Audiology at Brooklyn College. During her time at high school Cherry completed work experience in laboratories in New York City.[1] Here she studied the feeding habits of amoeba and proteoglycans.[2] She eventually studied chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, and graduated in 1994.[3] During her undergraduate research she looked at new synthesis pathways for drug scaffolds with Peter G. Schultz.[3] She moved to Massachusetts Institute of Technology for her doctoral research, where she worked on V(D)J recombination with David Baltimore.[3][4] During her research she recognised that, contrary to what was previously thought, demethylation was not responsible for the activation of V(D)J recombination.[5] It was under the guidance of Baltimore that Cherry became fascinated by virology.[2] When considering further research positions, Cherry knew that she wanted to learn more about viruses, and develop an unbiased, systematic genetic screening protocol.[2] She was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School, where she worked with Norbert Perrimon on the development of high-throughput screening to monitor virus-host cell interactions.[3][6]

Research and career

In 2006 Cherry joined the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.[7] Here she combined her experience with high-throughput RNA interference (RNAi) screening with other cell-based screening techniques.[3] Cherry studies viral pathogenesis, which includes both the ways viruses replicate and the anti-virus mechanisms within host cells. She is interested in how viruses hijack the machinery within a cell whilst evading their defence mechanisms.[3] She primarily studies anthropod–borne viruses that impact RNA, including West Nile virus and Zika virus, as well as alphaviruses and bunyavirales.[8] Anthropod-borne viruses contain very little genetic information (around 11 kilobytes), but can infect and replicate in a variety of hosts.[2] Her research makes use of the model organism drosophila, high-throughput screening, functional genomics and forward genetics to better identify the genes that impact the life cycle of a virus.[8] In 2017 she demonstrated an inhibitor to Zika virus, a mosquito-borne virus that had previously evaded treatment.[9] Zika virus enters human cells through endocytosis, and bind to the cell's outer membrane via the clathrin.[9] Cherry demonstrated that the antiviral Nanchangmycin restricts this mode of entry.[9] Alongside her work in virology, Cherry has started to screen acute leukaemia patients to better understand how they will respond to advance therapeutics.[2]

During the COVID-19 pandemic Cherry looked to identify novel therapeutic strategies, making use of her extensive small molecule library to identify chemical compounds that are active against SARS-CoV-2.[10] She has investigated remdesivir, an antiviral that was developed for the Ebola virus disease, and chloroquine, an antimalarial medication.[10] She used the high-throughput screening facility at the biosafety level-3 laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania to screen thousands of drugs at a time.[10][11] Remdesivir is a nucleoside analogue that tries to stop the spread of the virus by forcing it to make mistakes when replicating its RNA, causing the strands themselves to break. She has also considered therapies that prevent the virus from ever entering cells, either through the modification of the virus or the host itself. The treatment may also come in the form of an interferon.[10] To determine which treatments will be most appropriate, Cherry looks to identify which proteins SARS-CoV-2 makes use of for infection.[10] As the availability of N95 masks decreased, Cherry purchased several powered air-purifying respirators (PAPRs) battery-driven hoods that circulate filtered air for members of her research team.[12]

Awards and honours
  • 2011 Burroughs Wellcome Investigators in the Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease Award[13][14]
  • 2019 Perelman School of Medicine Awards of Excellence Stanley N. Cohen Biomedical Research Award[15][16]

Selected publications
  • Lee, Peggy P.; Fitzpatrick, David R.; Beard, Caroline; Jessup, Heidi K.; Lehar, Sophie; Makar, Karen W.; Pérez-Melgosa, Mercedes; Sweetser, Marianne T.; Schlissel, Mark S.; Nguyen, Suzanne; Cherry, Sara R. (2001-11-01). "A Critical Role for Dnmt1 and DNA Methylation in T Cell Development, Function, and Survival". Immunity. 15 (5): 763–774. doi:10.1016/S1074-7613(01)00227-8. ISSN 1074-7613. PMID 11728338.
  • Buchon, Nicolas; Silverman, Neal; Cherry, Sara (December 2014). "Immunity in Drosophila melanogaster — from microbial recognition to whole-organism physiology". Nature Reviews Immunology. 14 (12): 796–810. doi:10.1038/nri3763. ISSN 1474-1741. PMC 6190593. PMID 25421701.
  • Shelly, Spencer; Lukinova, Nina; Bambina, Shelly; Berman, Allison; Cherry, Sara (2009-04-17). "Autophagy Is an Essential Component of Drosophila Immunity against Vesicular Stomatitis Virus". Immunity. 30 (4): 588–598. doi:10.1016/j.immuni.2009.02.009. ISSN 1074-7613. PMC 2754303. PMID 19362021.

Cherry serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Experimental Medicine.[17] She serves on the Board of the Society of Functional Precision Medicine.[18]

References
  1. O’Garra, Anne; Belkaid, Yasmine; Sharpe, Arlene; Kaech, Susan; Cherry, Sara; Passegué, Emmanuelle (2020-03-02). "JEM women in STEM: Unique journeys with a common purpose". Journal of Experimental Medicine. 217 (3). doi:10.1084/jem.20200254. ISSN 0022-1007.
  2. Cherry, Sara (2018-08-09). "From chemistry to fruit flies: An unpredictable series of fortunate conversations". PLOS Pathogens. 14 (8): e1007077. doi:10.1371/journal.ppat.1007077. ISSN 1553-7374. PMC 6084988. PMID 30092102.
  3. "Sara Cherry". Lorne Infection & Immunity 2020. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  4. Cherry, Sara R (1999). The regulation of V(D)J recombination (Thesis). OCLC 44947964.
  5. Cherry, Sara R.; Beard, Caroline; Jaenisch, Rudolf; Baltimore, David (2000-07-18). "V(D)J recombination is not activated by demethylation of the kappa locus". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 97 (15): 8467–8472. Bibcode:2000PNAS...97.8467C. doi:10.1073/pnas.150218497. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 26971. PMID 10880575.
  6. "Sara Cherry, PhD | Penn Center for Precision Medicine | Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania". www.med.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  7. "Sara Cherry". perrimon.med.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  8. "Faculty | Biomedical Graduate Studies | Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania". www.med.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  9. "Penn Study Identifies Potent Inhibitor of Zika Entry into Human Cells – PR News". www.pennmedicine.org. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  10. "As many labs go quiet, research to find a coronavirus therapy ramps up". Penn Today. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  11. "Speaker - Cell Symposia: Cancer and Inflammation and Immunity". www.cell-symposia.com. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  12. Wu, Katherine J. (2020-03-10). "A Mask Shortage Could Threaten Research When We Need It Most". Slate Magazine. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  13. Sansone, Christine L.; Cohen, Jonathan; Yasunaga, Ari; Xu, Jie; Osborn, Greg; Subramanian, Harry; Gold, Beth; Buchon, Nicolas; Cherry, Sara (November 2015). "Microbiota-Dependent Priming of Antiviral Intestinal Immunity in Drosophila". Cell Host & Microbe. 18 (5): 571–581. doi:10.1016/j.chom.2015.10.010. PMC 4648705. PMID 26567510.
  14. "Pinpointing Weaknesses in Zika Infection | Burroughs Wellcome Fund". www.bwfund.org. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  15. "2019 Perelman School of Medicine Awards of Excellence". almanac.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  16. "The Society for Functional Precision Medicine". www.sfpm.io. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
  17. Nathan, Carl F.; Nussenzweig, Michel C.; Pulvirenti, Teodoro (2020-02-03). "JEM goes viral". Journal of Experimental Medicine. 217 (2). doi:10.1084/jem.20200046. ISSN 0022-1007. PMC 7041700. PMID 31961374.
  18. "About Us | The Society for Functional Precision Medicine". www.sfpm.io. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
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