Dr. Erin Sully focuses her work on patent drafting and prosecution and freedom to operate with an emphasis on biology, immunology, and biotechnology.

Prior to joining Morrison & Foerster, Dr. Sully was an IP practice specialist at a global law firm where she drafted and prosecuted patent applications in areas such as therapeutic antibodies, therapeutic oligonucleotides, cancer diagnosis and therapy, and drug regimens for organ transplantation.

Dr. Sully was a postdoctoral researcher at Oregon State University where she investigated the efficacy of antisense antibiotics, phosphorodiamidate morpholino oligomers (PMOs), on antibiotic-resistant pathogenic bacteria including Klebsiella pneumonia, Escherichia coli, and Haemophilus influenza. She also helped to determine the extent of inhibition of specific bacterial proteins using in vitro reporter assays, including biofilm assays, MIC assays, and in vivo mouse models of bacterial sepsis and pneumonia.

While Dr. Sully was a postdoctoral fellow for the New York Department of Health at the Wadsworth Center, she examined the mechanisms by which monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies neutralize ricin toxin as well as identified key neutralizing epitopes on ricin and used this information to generate new candidate vaccines. She also helped to determine protective capacities of various chimeric and humanized monoclonal antibodies in cell based cytotoxicity assays and murine models of lethal ricin challenge, in both systemic and mucosal compartments.

Dr. Sully earned her Ph.D. in biomedical sciences at the University of New Mexico where she investigated the efficacy of specific small molecules as inhibitors of Staphylococcus aureus virulence factor production. She also tested in vivo protective effect of small molecules in mouse air pouch and dermonecrosis S.aureus infection models.

Dr. Sully received her B.S. in biological sciences from the University of California, Irvine where she was an undergraduate research assistant and participated in molecular biology aspects of research project investigating the effects of beta-amyloid in neurodegenerative disease.

Dr. Sully is registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.