David Sacks

Biosketch

David Sacks is a Senior Investigator and Chief of the Intracellular Parasite Biology Section, Laboratory of Parasitic Disease, Division of Intramural Research, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), NIH. His research program focuses on the immunology of Leishmaniasis in humans and in animal models, and the cell biology of leishmanial infections within their mammalian hosts and sand fly vectors. Sacks was born in Boston in 1950 and received his B.A. degree in anthropology from McGill University in 1972. He received his Ph.D. in 1978 from the Harvard School of Public Health studying the immunology of Chlamydia trachomatis eye diseases, and performed postdoctoral work with Brigitte Askonas at the National Institute for Medical Research in London studying the immunology of African trypanosomiasis. In 1980 he was recruited by Alan Sher to the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases at the NIAID to establish a research program studying another vector-born tropical disease, Leishmaniasis. In 1986 he was appointed Senior Investigator where his lab has continued multidisciplinary studies of leishmanial diseases. Sacks is a recipient of the NIH Director’s Award, the Chalmer’s Medal from the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine, and the Bailey Ashford Medal from the American Society for Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. He was elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology in 2007, and conferred an honorary doctoral degree from the University of York in 2018.

Research Interests

The Sacks laboratory has had a major focus on the development and transmission of the Leishmania parasite by its vector Phlebotomine sand flies, and on studying immune responses in the context of natural transmission. These studies have made critical contributions to our understanding of the life cycle of the Leishmania parasite, including identification of a unique stage in the insect that is infective to the mammalian host, quantification of the infectious dose delivered to the skin by sand fly bite, and the discovery of a Leishmania sexual cycle in the vector that contributes to the extensive diversity of the genus. His immunological studies have revealed the critical role that neutrophils and dermis resident macrophages play in the early establishment of infection in the skin, the contribution of IL-10 to the pathogenesis of visceral leishmaniasis and to the persistence of Leishmania following clinical cure, and the role of innate cells and type 2 cytokines in the pathogenesis of chronic forms of cutaneous disease.