biography
“Infectious disease is the second leading killer in the world today. That’s one of the main reasons I focus on vaccines. They really have the potential for improving lives and saving lives." – Shane Crotty, Ph.D.
Shane Crotty is an Assistant Member in the Vaccine Discovery Division.
Dr. Crotty's research focus is on immune system memory, with particular
interest in the roles of these mechanisms in human vaccines and
protection from infectious diseases.
Dr. Crotty received his B.S. in Biology from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology in 1996. He also received a B.S. in Writing
from MIT the same year. Dr. Crotty undertook graduate work in virology
at the University of California, San Francisco in the Program in
Biological Sciences. There he discovered the mechanism of action of the
antiviral drug ribavirin, widely used to treat chronic hepatitis C
infections. He earned his PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in
2001. Dr. Crotty then pursued postdoctoral work at the Emory University
Vaccine Center with Dr. Rafi Ahmed from 2001 to 2003, studying aspects of the generation
and maintenance of immune memory after viral infections. In 2003 he
accepted a faculty position at LIAI.
Dr. Crotty was also recently named a Pew Scholar, marking him as one of
the most promising young scientists in the country today. This
distinction was given to only 14 other researchers in the country in
2005 and is coupled with a grant to aid Dr. Crotty in pursuing his
research goals.
Dr. Crotty is also the author of Ahead of the Curve, a biography of
Nobel laureate scientist David Baltimore, published in 2001, and reviewed in The Wall Street Journal, Nature, The
Washington Post, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA),
Nature Medicine, Publishers Weekly, and Discover Magazine.
research focus
Shane Crotty, Ph.D., and his team study immunity against infectious
diseases. They investigate how the immune system remembers infections
and vaccines. By remembering infections and vaccines, the body is
protected from becoming infected in the future. Vaccines are one of the
most cost-effective medical treatments in modern civilization and are
responsible for saving millions of lives. Yet, good vaccines are very
difficult to design, and a better understanding of immune memory will
facilitate the ability to make new vaccines.
Dr. Crotty's team has discovered that anti-smallpox B cells, white blood
cells responsible for producing antibodies against smallpox
virus, remain present and active in the human body for up to 60 years
after immunization with the smallpox vaccine. By analyzing the
similarities and differences between the smallpox vaccine and less
effective vaccines, it is the goal of Dr. Crotty and his laboratory to
decipher the secrets of generating lifelong immune memory.
Another way Dr. Crotty's team studies immune memory is by understanding
the function of a gene called SH2D1A or SAP. This gene is mutated in
the human genetic disease XLP (X-linked lymphoproliferative disease).
Children affected by this disease are immunodeficient and usually die
from infectious diseases before reaching adulthood. Dr. Crotty has
discovered that the SAP gene plays a central role in generation of
immune memory. Understanding the role of SAP in greater detail may help
XLP patients and may, more broadly, allow for the design of better
human vaccines that take advantage of SAP's important role in the
process of generating immune memory.
selected publications
Redundancy and Plasticity of Neutralizing Antibody Responses Are Cornerstone Attributes of the Human Immune Response to the Smallpox Vaccine.
Journal of Virology. 2008
Click here to download this paper.
SAP Regulation of Follicular Helper CD4 T Cell Development and Humoral Immunity Is Independent of SLAM and Fyn Kinase1. The Journal of Immunology. 2007.
Click here to download this paper.
Vaccinia Virus H3L Envelope Protein Is a Major Target of Neutralizing Antibodies in Humans and Elicits Protection against Lethal Challenge in Mice. Journal of Virology. 2005.
Click here to download this paper.
Profiling the humoral immune response to infection by using proteome
microarrays: high-throughput vaccine and diagnostic antigen discovery. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2005
Click here to download this paper.
Tracking human antigen-specific memory B cells: a sensitive and generalized ELISPOT system. J Immunol Methods. 2004
Click here to download this paper.
Immune responses to Bacillus anthracis protective antigen in patients
with bioterrorism-related cutaneous or inhalation anthrax. J Infect Dis. 2004
Click here to download this paper.
Immunological memory in humans. Semin Immunol. 2004
Click here to download this paper.
Cutting edge: long-term B cell memory in humans after smallpox vaccination. J Immunol. 2003
Click here to download this paper.
SAP is required for generating long-term humoral immunity. Nature. 2003
Click here to download this paper.
Ribavirin's antiviral mechanism of action: lethal mutagenesis? J Mol Med. 2002
Click here to download this paper.
Protection against simian immunodeficiency virus vaginal challenge by using Sabin poliovirus vectors. J Virol. 2001
Click here to download this paper.
RNA virus error catastrophe: direct molecular test by using ribavirin. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2001
Click here to download this paper.
The broad-spectrum antiviral ribonucleoside ribavirin is an RNA virus mutagen. Nat Med. 2000
Click here to download this paper.
Cytotoxic T-cell immunity to virus-infected non-haematopoietic cells requires presentation of exogenous antigen. Nature. 1999
Click here to download this paper.
View all publications
The link above may include papers by scientists with the same or similar name.
staff list
Click researcher's name for e-mail. Dial 858-752-6500 to call.
