Professor
The following is the Department’s tribute to Professor Cherry upon his retirement.
The Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences would like to thank Professor James Cherry for his excellent work at Boston University over the course of his career.
Dr. Cherry began as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Boston University in 1995, received tenure in 2001 and became a Full Professor in 2011. He was also affiliated with and taught in the Undergraduate and Graduate Programs for Neuroscience.
Professor Cherry has had an impact on many undergraduate and graduate students at Boston University. For many years he taught undergraduate courses including PS231: Physiological Psychology, PS504: Genes, Brain and Behavior as well as graduate courses such as PS738: Systems and Cognitive Neuroscience, and PS836: Molecules and Behavior. He trained many undergraduates and graduate students in his laboratory, including Dr. Brett DiBenedictis, who went to a faculty position before returning as a lecturer in our department.
Jim and his laboratory published over 50 research publications in journals including Neuropharmacology, Behavioral Neuroscience, Journal of Neuroscience, Hormones and Behavior, Chemical Senses, eNeuro, and many other journals. Jim is a specialty Chief editor in Behavioral Endocrinology for Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. Funding for his work included an NIH R01 grant for work on Olfactory Circuits for Reproduction and Reward.
Prof. Jim Cherry has made many fascinating research contributions in his career. This includes a focus on dimorphisms in the nervous system based on sex, including differences in anatomical patterns of connectivity in the olfactory system and the important influences of gonadal hormones such as testosterone and estradiol. His work focused on the use of the mouse olfactory system to understand how odors involved in reproduction, such as pheromones, are processed differentially by males and females, and the role of gonadal hormones in affecting such processing. This includes extensive analysis of the role of the vomeronasal system and accessory olfactory bulb in relationship to the main olfactory bulb. In one highly cited finding, his lab showed a surprising direct main olfactory bulb projection to the amygdala that responded to male pheromones. His work also addressed other sexually dimorphic behaviors in rodents, with the goal of extending findings to humans. In other earlier research, he also analyzed the role of the Type 4 (cAMP-specific) phosphodiesterase (PDE4) that influenced learning in drosophila and extended these studies to showing its role in olfactory perception and learning in the mouse.
Jim also made many important service contributions during his career at BU. He has served as the Vice Chair of the Boston University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) since 2020 and served on many departmental committees as well serving as the Director of Graduate Studies in our department. He also served on important University review committees including the Appointment Promotions and Tenure Committee (APT).
We thank Jim for his many years of work for his students, the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, and Boston University and wish him a happy and well-deserved retirement.
The following is Professor Cherry’s original faculty profile.
Director of Graduate Studies
Director: Laboratory of Molecular Neurobiology & Behavior
My research interests address sex dimorphisms in the nervous system. In general, our goal is to understand the extent to which behavioral sex differences are anatomically ‘hard-wired’, or are due to the presence of particular gonadal hormones (e.g., testosterone and estradiol). I currently use the mouse olfactory system as a model to understand the pathways and mechanisms by which odors involved in reproduction, such as pheromones, are processed differentially by males and females, and the role of gonadal hormones in affecting such processing. We have also begun to apply this analysis to other sexually dimorphic behaviors exhibited by rodents, with the goal of extending our findings to humans.