Clinical trials focused on diagnostics, novel treatment strategies, and treatment shortening methodologies for tuberculosis.

Dr. Chen graduated from the Medical College of Virginia/Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia, then trained in Internal Medicine at the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and in Infectious Diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). While at UAB, he also earned a Master of Science in Public Health with a concentration in epidemiology.

Dr. Chen came to NIAID in 2003 to the Division of AIDS (DAIDS) and was based in Beijing, China for DAIDS from 2004-2012, working with Chinese investigators. In 2012, he returned to Bethesda, MD and joined the Tuberculosis Research Section in the Laboratory of Clinical Immunology and Microbiology, Division of Intramural Research.

Chen RY, Yu X, Smith B, Liu X, Gao J, Diacon AH, Dawson R, Tameris M, Zhu H, Qu Y, Zhang R, Pan S, Jin X, Goldfeder LC, Cai Y, Arora K, Wang J, Vincent J, Malherbe ST, Thienemann F, Wilkinson RJ, Walzl G, Barry CE 3rd. Radiological and functional evidence of the bronchial spread of tuberculosis: an observational analysis. Lancet Microbe. 2021 Oct;2(10):e518-e526.

Xie YL, de Jager VR, Chen RY, Dodd LE, Paripati P, Via LE, Follmann D, Wang J, Lumbard K, Lahouar S, Malherbe ST, Andrews J, Yu X, Goldfeder LC, Cai Y, Arora K, Loxton AG, Vanker N, Duvenhage M, Winter J, Song T, Walzl G, Diacon AH, Barry CE 3rd. Fourteen-day PET/CT imaging to monitor drug combination activity in treated individuals with tuberculosis. Sci Transl Med. 2021 Feb 3;13(579):eabd7618.

Lee A, Xie YL, Barry CE, Chen RY. Current and future treatments for tuberculosis. BMJ. 2020 Mar 2;368:m216.

Xie YL, Chakravorty S, Armstrong DT, Hall SL, Via LE, Song T, Yuan X, Mo X, Zhu H, Xu P, Gao Q, Lee M, Lee J, Smith LE, Chen RY, Joh JS, Cho Y, Liu X, Ruan X, Liang L, Dharan N, Cho SN, Barry CE 3rd, Ellner JJ, Dorman SE, Alland D. Evaluation of a Rapid Molecular Drug-Susceptibility Test for Tuberculosis. N Engl J Med. 2017 Sep 14;377(11):1043-1054.

Malherbe ST, Shenai S, Ronacher K, Loxton AG, Dolganov G, Kriel M, Van T, Chen RY, Warwick J, Via LE, Song T, Lee M, Schoolnik G, Tromp G, Alland D, Barry CE 3rd, Winter J, Walzl G; Catalysis TB–Biomarker Consortium, Lucas L, Spuy GV, Stanley K, Thiart L, Smith B, Du Plessis N, Beltran CG, Maasdorp E, Ellmann A, Choi H, Joh J, Dodd LE, Allwood B, Koegelenberg C, Vorster M, Griffith-Richards S. Persisting positron emission tomography lesion activity and Mycobacterium tuberculosis mRNA after tuberculosis cure. Nat Med. 2016 Oct;22(10):1094-1100.

Chen RY, Dodd LE, Lee M, Paripati P, Hammoud DA, Mountz JM, Jeon D, Zia N, Zahiri H, Coleman MT, Carroll MW, Lee JD, Jeong YJ, Herscovitch P, Lahouar S, Tartakovsky M, Rosenthal A, Somaiyya S, Lee S, Goldfeder LC, Cai Y, Via LE, Park SK, Cho SN, Barry CE 3rd. PET/CT imaging correlates with treatment outcome in patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. Sci Transl Med. 2014 Dec 3;6(265):265ra166.

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Dr. Sakai’s major scientific goals are to understand how the host immune response suppresses growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in the lungs without leading to excessive tissue damage. He is a leading expert in the design and execution of in vivo cellular immunology experiments using mice models of M. tuberculosis infection to develop hypotheses that can be further explored in larger animal species including non-human primates.

Dr. Sakai received his Ph.D. in 2011 from the Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Japan. In 2012, he joined the T-Lymphocyte Biology Section led by Dr. Daniel Barber in the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, NIAID as a Visiting Fellow and he was appointed to the position of Staff Scientist in 2018.

Sakai S, Lora NE, Kauffman KD, Dorosky DE, Oh S, Namasivayam S, Gomez F, Fleegle JD; Tuberculosis Imaging Program, Arlehamn CSL, Sette A, Sher A, Freeman GJ, Via LE, Barry Iii CE, Barber DL. Functional inactivation of pulmonary MAIT cells following 5-OP-RU treatment of non-human primates. Mucosal Immunol. 2021 Sep;14(5):1055-1066. 

Kauffman KD, Sakai S, Lora NE, Namasivayam S, Baker PJ, Kamenyeva O, Foreman TW, Nelson CE, Oliveira-de-Souza D, Vinhaes CL, Yaniv Z, Lindestam Arleham CS, Sette A, Freeman GJ, Moore R; NIAID/DIR Tuberculosis Imaging Program, Sher A, Mayer-Barber KD, Andrade BB, Kabat J, Via LE, Barber DL. PD-1 blockade exacerbates Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection in rhesus macaques. Sci Immunol. 2021 Jan 15;6(55):eabf3861. 

Sakai S, Kauffman KD, Oh S, Nelson CE, Barry CE 3rd, Barber DL. MAIT cell-directed therapy of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection. Mucosal Immunol. 2021 Jan;14(1):199-208. 

Barber DL, Sakai S, Kudchadkar RR, Fling SP, Day TA, Vergara JA, Ashkin D, Cheng JH, Lundgren LM, Raabe VN, Kraft CS, Nieva JJ, Cheever MA, Nghiem PT, Sharon E. Tuberculosis following PD-1 blockade for cancer immunotherapy. Sci Transl Med. 2019 Jan 16;11(475):eaat2702. 

Sakai S, Kauffman KD, Sallin MA, Sharpe AH, Young HA, Ganusov VV, Barber DL. CD4 T Cell-Derived IFN-γ Plays a Minimal Role in Control of Pulmonary Mycobacterium tuberculosis Infection and Must Be Actively Repressed by PD-1 to Prevent Lethal Disease. PLoS Pathog. 2016 May 31;12(5):e1005667. 

Sakai S, Kauffman KD, Schenkel JM, McBerry CC, Mayer-Barber KD, Masopust D, Barber DL. Cutting edge: control of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection by a subset of lung parenchyma-homing CD4 T cells. J Immunol. 2014 Apr 1;192(7):2965-9. doi: 10.4049/jimmunol.1400019.