Keith R. Jerome is an American virologist whose research focuses on viruses such as herpes simplex, HIV and hepatitis B that persist in their hosts.
[2][3][4] In 2021, Jerome and Alexander Greninger shared the Washington Innovator of the Year award for developing the laboratory based assay for detecting COVID-19.
[5] He was senior author on a research article published in Science describing the cryptic transmission of SARS-CoV-2 alongside Trevor Bedford, Alexander Greninger, Jay Shendure, and Helen Chu.
He has been working for years on research aimed at a cure for Herpes virus by using the DNA-cutting tools of gene therapy.
[8] He and his colleagues are exploring this approach in combination with blood stem cell transplants as a means of curing HIV.