Danny Schust, MD
Edwin Crowell Hamblen Distinguished Professor of Reproductive Biology and Family Planning
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Duke University School of Medicine
He/him
Description: Five decades of research in human reproductive immunology have resulted in an almost full erasure of proven tests and interventions for common disorders of early pregnancy (e.g., isolated and recurrent early pregnancy loss) and common disorders of abnormal placentation (pre-eclampsia and intrauterine growth restriction). However, we have learned from these misguided efforts that to study normal and anormal human peri-implantation biology, consistencies in species, timing and location are all essential. This lecture will use the many lessons learned from the study of human reproductive immunology as a case study on the informed development of in vitro models to study human peri-implantation biology, including their uses, advantages, limitations and misuses. The audience should come away with an excellent understanding of human reproductive immunology and a set of in vitro approaches that can be leveraged to study the effects of environmental toxins and exposures that can adversely impact human pre-implantation embryo development, embryo implantation, post-implantation placentation, the health of mother and baby during pregnancy and, ultimately, the long-term health trajectories of both the mother and her offspring.
About the speaker: Dr. Danny Schust was born in a small mining town in New Mexico where his father mined uranium, then moved to Wisconsin in middle school. He attended the University of Wisconsin, where he completed a 7-year program that combined his undergraduate and medical school education. He did his residency in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a fellowship in Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He then caught the research bug, completing a 6-year postdoctoral training program in immunopathology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard Medical School, before rejoining clinical medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and then Boston University. He served as the Division head for Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility and the Director of the MD/PhD training program at the University of Missouri during his 16 years in that job, then moved back to North Carolina.
Dr. Schust is presently the Edwin Crowell Hamblen Distinguished Professor of Reproductive Biology and Family Planning, Vice Chair for Research in Obstetrics and Gynecology, and the Director of the Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility Fellowship Program, all at Duke University. He presently splits his time between clinical and administrative duties and basic science research. His clinical interests include isolated and recurrent pregnancy loss and gynecology and early pregnancy imaging. His research lab studies early human placental development, placental immunology, placental infections, stem cell biology. His fairly recent move to Duke has fostered collaborative work on the effects of several environmental exposures on human pregnancy. Dr. Schust has authored or co-authored over 190 manuscripts and book chapters as well as a textbook for medical students on reproductive physiology. He is the proud director of the national NIH K12 training program for physician-scientists, the Reproductive Scientist Development Program.
Dr. Schust and his wife, Linda, have three children–one in college, one in graduate school and one in law school–and live with 3 dogs and a cat. He and his wife are obsessive gardeners.
Thursday, February 20, 2025, 12:00-1:15pm Eastern
Field Auditorium, Room 1112, Grainger Hall (9 Circuit Drive, Durham, NC)
This seminar will also be presented live via Panopto. Click HERE for the livestream.