Dr. Nancy Sullivan, the new director of the National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories (NEIDL) at Boston University, has been appointed as a professor in the Department of Biology in the College of Arts & Sciences. She will also serve as the inaugural holder of an Edward Avedisian Professorship and as a professor of Microbiology in the Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine.
“We are delighted to welcome Dr. Sullivan to the A&S faculty in our department of biology, with joint appointment in the Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine,” said Stan Sclaroff, dean of Arts & Sciences. “Dr. Sullivan has devoted her career to high-impact science characterized by innovation and a vision for anticipating and preparing for emerging infectious diseases through insightful work on vaccines and therapeutics. As the Director of Boston University’s Biosafety Level 4 National Emerging Infectious Disease Laboratory, Dr. Sullivan is poised to make transformative contributions to BU’s research reputation in the areas of virology, vaccine development, and epidemiology.”
An internationally respected leader in viral biology, emerging diseases prevention, and infectious disease research, Dr. Sullivan previously served as chief of the Biodefense Research Section at the Vaccine Research Center in the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID). Over the decades, her work has produced a host of translational breakthroughs, including the discovery of the first vaccine to protect primates from Ebola virus and of a protective monoclonal antibody, mAb114, that is being used in its treatment.
“Professor Nancy J. Sullivan is a world-renowned biologist and virologist with a long and distinguished record of research accomplishments and leadership roles,” said Chair of Biology Professor Pamela Templer. “She is known for her proactive approach to addressing disease and developing vaccines and we are fortunate, excited, and thrilled to have Professor Sullivan join the NEIDL and Department of Biology at Boston University.”
A Boston-area native, Sullivan earned her undergraduate degree at Merrimack College and doctorate at Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health—Dr. Sullivan was named Time’s 2014 Person of the Year in “The Ebola Fighters” — the healthcare workers and scientists who tackled an outbreak of the disease in West Africa — and was included in the Politico Top 50 in 2015. In addition, she has been an NIH subject matter expert in several areas, including filoviruses, medical countermeasures for public health emergencies, accelerating COVID-19 therapeutic interventions and vaccines, and pandemic preparedness, and a World Health Organization subject matter expert on Marburg vaccines.
“Dr. Sullivan is an internationally recognized leader in viral biology and emerging diseases prevention who is ideally suited to lead the NEIDL to new levels of scientific discovery,” Dean Sclaroff added. “Her primary goal, moving forward, is to elucidate novel mechanisms for immune protection against rapidly evolving and re-emerging virus, and to define the evolutionary pathways underlying viral evasion of the human immune system.”
“My role is to elevate the science,” Dr. Sullivan said. “I’ve had a long-standing interest in epidemic and pandemic preparedness. After COVID, many more are appreciating the potential of viruses to act in unpredictable ways. At the NEIDL, we are positioned to step in at this important time and define basic mechanisms of virus pathogenesis and immune clearance. This will help us and others to develop vaccines and therapeutics that can be on the shelf and ready to use when the next pathogen with pandemic potential arises.”
Read more about Dr. Sullivan’s NEIDL appointment in BU Today.
arts&sciences recently spoke to Dr. Sullivan about her work and undergraduate experiences.
A&S: How did you get interested in biology and infectious diseases? Have you always had a passion for studying biology and infectious diseases, or was there a moment you can recall where you realized that’s what you are truly interested in?
NS: I always had a natural curiosity and interest in nature, in how things work, that fits pretty well with biology. And then, when I was an undergraduate at a small catholic college, Merrimack, there was a biochemistry professor who was terrific. He just had such enthusiasm. And it’s biochemistry, so if you can convey enthusiasm about side chains of amino acids, that makes a difference. I think faculty can really make a difference in the lives of students.
I became interested in infectious diseases by accident. I started graduate school with an interest in cell biology and how membranes in the cell fuse to bring proteins to the surface. Membranes are naturally repellent. Otherwise we’d be a bag of water. There have to be active processes and molecules that help bring membranes together. A seminar was given in the Virology course by Joseph Sodroski, whose field of interest includes HIV fusion with the cell membrane. HIV has a surface protein that it uses to bind to the membrane and then make a pore and allows the membranes to fuse. I remember thinking at the time, “what a cool way to study membrane fusion. Maybe I can do a rotation in his lab,” but still thinking that I would focus on cell biology. It was by getting into this lab and being engaged in viral immunology that really set a fire within me to study infectious disease and viruses, how fascinating viruses are and how they evolve to continue existing, in spite of the forces against them in the host.
a&s: What about joining the Department of Biology are you most looking forward to? Will you be teaching? Do you have plans to engage BU students in your research?
While I’m the director of the NEIDL, I will not be teaching, I will have a research lab, so I can accept students into my lab to do research. I like teaching, but right now that can’t be the case. A lot of what I will do will be to support the PIs in the NEIDL. I’ll have a research focus, not very different from what I was doing at NIH, that will feed into the different PIs here and help round out some of their studies.
a&s: What are some of the toughest challenges you’ve faced while working as an infectious disease biologist? What have the last 3.5 years been like for you as an infectious disease expert?
NS: This may sound trite but the challenges are oftentimes the opportunities. Over the past 3.5 years, it’s been challenging and exhausting but it’s been amazing for advances in viral immunology. SARS-CoV-2 was teaching us things we didn’t know. Back in the very beginning, even people who had worked on other SARS viruses, said, “this won’t be like flu, we don’t have to worry about new variants all the time.” And we do. It taught us new things about the capacity of viruses to co-exist. The advances were due to teams of people sharing data in real time, synthesizing from a lot of data to the important things that we want to tackle, groups of scientists working together on vaccines and therapies. It’s been a really interesting time in terms of seeing people work together who might ordinarily view themselves as competitors. Everyone has worked relentlessly to keep up with the variants, but it’s been an amazing experience in terms of the science.
a&s: Do you have any advice for Arts & Sciences students?
Be flexible to find what really drives you to get up in the morning and go through your day. We can study something in college and then think, “oh I have to do this because this is what I studied.” You don’t have to. You have to find what your passion is.
If someone goes to graduate school and studies immunology and decides they want to be a physicist, they should be open to it. I didn’t go to graduate school thinking I would be a viral immunologist, but it is important to have that passion for everything that you’re doing, to have a natural curiosity, to be successful.
I’m very thankful for my liberal arts degree. I’ll hear people say, “Why do I need philosophy”? A liberal arts education broadens your thinking and helps you in ways that you can’t force when you’re sitting in the sociology or philosophy course. I use some of the basic concepts from my sociology courses today, even in my management style for working with people. Maybe in English I took a short story course and thought it wasn’t necessary because, “I’m not going to be an author.” Well, the truth is, I write papers all the time. Being able to tell a story in science is important, not just presenting data.”