Scientific Advisory Board

Dean Sheppard, M.D., holds a variety of positions at UCSF, including Chief of the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, Allergy and Sleep Medicine, Professor of Medicine and a member of the cell biology, biomedical sciences, immunology and pharmaceutical sciences, and pharmacogenomics graduate programs. His research focuses on the molecular mechanisms underlying pulmonary (and other organ) fibrosis, asthma and acute lung injury. One aim of his research is to identify new therapeutic targets to ultimately improve the treatment of each of these common diseases. The work begins with basic investigation of how cells use members of the integrin family to detect, modify and respond to spatially restricted extracellular clues and how these responses contribute to the development of common lung diseases. Utilizing mice with global or conditional knockouts of four integrins, the epithelial-restricted integrin, avß6, and the widely expressed integrins a9ß1, avß1, avß5 and avß8, Dr. Sheppard’s lab has identified important roles for these integrins in models of each common lung disease and key steps upstream and downstream of the integrins that provide potential therapeutic targets.

Dr. Sheppard holds an A.B. in social studies from Harvard College and an M.D. from SUNY at Stony Brook. He trained in internal medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle and in pulmonary medicine at UCSF. He has been on the faculty of UCSF since 1980, and was appointed the Founding Director of the Lung Biology Research Center in 1986.