Cheryl L. Stucky, PhD, professor of cell biology, neurobiology and anatomy at the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), has been appointed to the Somatosensory and Chemosensory Systems (SCS) Study Section of the National Institutes of Health’s Center for Scientific Review. The four-year appointment runs through June 2016.
The SCS Study Section reviews research on the molecular biology, anatomy, physiology and psychophysics of specialized sensory systems such as chemosensory (taste and smell), pain and pain-relief, and somatosensory systems that regulate the response to outside stimuli such as touch and temperature (in animals and humans). The emphasis is on integrative systems approaches to understanding normal sensory function and sensory pathology due to injury or disease.
Dr. Stucky has studied somatosensory and pain research for the last two decades. The Stucky Lab was established in 1999 at MCW. Dr. Stucky and her team study the ways in which skin sensory neurons detect environmental stimuli such as pressure, temperature, and painful stimuli. She also researches the mechanisms that cause chronic pain such as nerve injury pain (diabetic neuropathy or shingles), inflammation pain and sickle cell disease pain. Her recent research focuses on a particular receptor called Transient Receptor Potential Ankyrin 1 (TRPA1) which detects force in skin and mediates inflammation-induced touch sensitivity.
Prior to joining the MCW faculty, Dr. Stucky did postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Wurzburg, Germany, and at the Max Delbruck Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin, Germany. The postdoctoral training in Germany allowed her to develop a specialized niche in the US in electrophysiological recordings of nerve cells to understand their function. She earned her PhD in neuroscience from the University of Minnesota in 1995.
Study section members are selected on the basis of their demonstrated competence and achievement in their scientific discipline as evidenced by the quality of their research accomplishments, publication in scientific journals and other significant scholarly activity.