UW Researcher Selected as a Rising Star

Brian Cherrington, assistant professor in the University of Wyoming Department of Zoology and Physiology, recently was selected as a Rising Star by the University of Washington’s Institute of Translational Health Sciences.

Rising Stars is a faculty career development program that provides promising early-stage investigators from the five-state WWAMI (Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho) region with a high-quality, targeted and structured career development package for two years. The package includes components such as research funding up to $15,000, mentoring, peer-to-peer networking and review services.

Cherrington, who teaches a section of a prerequisite human physiology course required by all students in the WWAMI medical education program, begins a two-year career-development program designed to culminate with a grant application submitted to the National Institutes of Health. He will receive mentoring and instruction in grant writing, monthly peer reviews to receive feedback on projects, and will face mock grant reviews.

His research focuses on ways to better understand the initiation and progression of sporadic pituitary tumors. He is studying how specific enzymes facilitate gene expression to promote pituitary cancer and how inhibiting such enzymes will slow tumor progression.

“The program is an excellent way to foster connections with exceptional clinicians as well as other young faculty who are drawn to translational science,” says Stephanie McCalla, assistant professor of chemical and biological engineering at Montana State University and one of the Rising Stars cohorts selected with Cherrington.

Cherrington joined the UW faculty in 2011. He received a B.A. (1996) in history from Washington University, and an M.S. (2001) and a Ph.D. (2005) in biomedical sciences, both from Colorado State University.