Cherié L. Butts

Butts Named FASEB Board Officer as Treasurer-Elect

Cherié L. Butts, Ph.D. (AAI ’10), who has served since 2017 as AAI representative to the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) Finance Committee, became FASEB treasurer-elect on July 1 following her selection by the FASEB Board of Directors. She will serve jointly as FASEB treasurer and Finance Committee chair beginning on July 1, 2022. Dr. Butts is the first industry scientist, first African American, and second woman scientist named to the position.

In 2020, as chair of the FASEB Emerging Issues/Revenue Opportunities Task Force, Butts helped identify a number of initiatives, including the FASEB Institute on Bioentrepreneurship, Drug Development, and Advocacy. As treasurer, she will play a major role in development of these initiatives.

Butts is medical director at Biogen in Cambridge, Massachusetts, leading activities to include more sensitive and specific measurement tools in clinical trials for drug candidates. She was clinical lead for Plegridy IM (interferon beta-1a), approved in 2021 in the United States and European Union for multiple sclerosis. Her recent work has included focus on health equity to identify opportunities to reduce the time to diagnosis and better understand the scientific basis for responses to therapies. Prior to joining Biogen, she was at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, where she conducted neuroendocrine immunology research and reviewed drug and biologics applications. Her early career research focused on characterizing dendritic cell-mediated immune responses in ovarian cancer patients and evaluating hormonal regulation of these responses in autoimmune and infectious disease models.

Butts is a member of the AAI Committee on Public Affairs (CPA), where she serves on the NIH and Public Health and Biosecurity (PHB) Subcommittees and has served on the Advocacy Programs Subcommittee. She served as scientific co-author of the AAI primer on the clinical trial vaccine development process produced by the PHB subcommittee in November 2020. Butts has also served as a member and chair of the AAI Minority Affairs Committee (MAC) and has been a strong advocate and advisor for AAI diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. At this year’s virtual AAI annual meeting, she was a panelist in the MAC-sponsored “Minority Scientists’ Experience: Challenging and Overcoming Barriers to Enhancing Diversity and Career Advancement” session. She also served as a returning table leader at the annual MAC Careers Roundtables. Butts is a past recipient of the AAI Minority Scientist Travel Award and AAI Trainee Abstract Award.

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