Dr. David Kushner

While my undergraduate interests were in developmental biology and East Asian Studies, my fascination with the cellular and molecular biology of pathogens led me to pursue research in virology. I have worked with Epstein-Barr virus, Herpes Simplex virus, adenoviruses, and HIV, but I currently study virus-host interaction using brome mosaic virus (BMV) and RNA sequence-structure-function relationships in the replication of a satellite RNA of turnip crinkle virus (TCV).

Courses Taught

Bioethics (First Year Seminar)
Infection vs. Immunity (BIOL 126)
Microbiology (BIOL 326)
Virology (BIOL 427)
RNA (BIOL 419)

Research

In my research we work with the plant virus BMV, which is a model RNA virus (interesting: not everything on Earth has a DNA genome!). Similar human pathogens include the SARS coronavirus, West Nile virus, and hepatitis C virus. We use genomic and bioinformatics approaches to identify host factors that are important in BMV life cycle processes, and use the genetically powerful system of yeast (see colonies of yeast on plate at left) as a model host. In other work in the lab, we study in vivo evolution of turnip crinkle virus RNA, trying to understand the relationship between viral RNA sequence, structure, and function in infected turnip plants.

Educational Background

Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Wisconsin Madison, 1999-2003

Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, 1998

B.S., Haverford College, 1993

Selected Publications (* indicates student co-author)

Guo, R., *Lin, W., Zhang, J., Simon, A.E., and Kushner, D.B. (2009). Structural plasticity and rapid evolution in a viral RNA revealed by in vivo genetic selection. Journal of Virology 83:927-39.

Shan, X., *Russell, T.A., *Paul, S.M., Kushner, D.B., and Joyce, P.B.M. (2008). Characterization of a temperature-sensitive mutation that impairs the function of yeast tRNA nucleotidyltransferase. Yeast 25:219-233.

Kushner, D.B. (2007). DNA microarrays in the undergraduate microbiology lab: experimentation and handling large datasets in as few as six weeks. Journal of Microbiology & Biology Education 8:3-12.

Ahlquist, P., Schwartz, M., Chen, J., Kushner, D., Hao, L., and Dye, B.T. (2005). Viral and host determinants of RNA virus vector replication and expression. Vaccine 23:1784-1787.

Williams, J.F., Zhang, Y., Williams, M.A., Hou, S., Kushner, D., and Ricciardi, R.P. (2004). E1A Based Determinants of Oncogenicity in Human Adenovirus Groups A and C. Current Topics in Microbiology and Immunology 273:245-288.

Kushner, D.B., Lindenbach, B.D., Grdzelishvili, V.Z., Noueiry, A.O., *Paul, S.M., and Ahlquist, P. (2003). Systematic, genome-wide identification of host genes affecting replication of a positive-strand RNA virus. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 100:15764-15769.

Ahlquist, P., Noueiry, A.O., Lee W.-M., Kushner, D.B., and Dye, B.T. (2003). Host Factors in Positive-Strand Virus Genome Replication. Journal of Virology 77:8181-8186.