The National Academy of Sciences recently announced the selection of 84 new members and 21 foreign associates. There are now 2,290 living members of the nation’s most prestigious society of scientific scholars.
The National Academy of Sciences does not publish data on the gender of its members. But according to a WIAReport analysis of the group of 84 new members, 23, or 27.4 percent, are women. The number and percentage of women new members is slightly lower than in 2015 or 2016. All but one of the new women members have current academic affiliations.
Here are brief biographies of the 22 women with current academic ties who were elected members of the National Academy of Sciences this year.
Dominique Bergmann is a professor of biology at Stanford University in California. She holds a Ph.D. in molecular biology from the University of Colorado.
Sangeeta N. Bhatia is the John J. and Dorothy Wilson Professor in the Institute of Medical Engineering and Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is a graduate of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, where she majored in biomedicine. Dr. Bhatia holds a master’s degree in mechanical engineering and a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from MIT and a medical degree from Harvard University.
Judith G. Cohen is the Kate VanNuys Page Professor of Astronomy at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. She joined the faculty there in 1979. Dr. Cohen is graduate of Radcliffe College. She holds a master’s degree from CalTech and a Ph.D. from the University of Arizona.
Marcetta Y. Darensbourg is a distinguished professor of chemistry at Texas A&M University in College Station. She is a graduate of Union College in Kentucky and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois.
Esther Duflo is Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics and co-director of the Abdul Latif Poverty Action Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She joined the faculty at MIT in 1999. Professor Duflo holds a Ph.D. in economics from MIT.
Mary K. Firestone is a professor of environmental science policy and management and associate dean of instruction and student affairs at the University of California, Berkeley. She holds a Ph.D. in soil microbiology from Michigan State University.
Gabriela Gonzalez is a professor in the department of physics and astronomy at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. A native of Argentina, Dr. Gonzalez holds a master’s degree from the University of Cordoba and a Ph.D. from Syracuse University in New York.
Mary E. Hatten is the Frederick P. Rose Professor of developmental neurobiology at Rockefeller University in New York City. She is a graduate of Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia, and holds a Ph.D. in biomedical sciences from Princeton University in New Jersey.
Leemor Joshua-Tor is a professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York. She is a graduate of Tel-Aviv University in Israel and holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from the Weitzman Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel.
Barbara B. Kahn is the George R. Minot Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. She also serves as vice chair for research strategy. Dr. Kahn earned bachelor’s and medical degrees at Stanford University and holds a master’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley.
Guillermina Lozano is a professor and chair of the department of genetics at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. She is a magna cum laude graduate of Pan American University in Edinburg, Texas. She earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Fiona B. Marshall is the James W. and Jean L. Davis Professor of anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis. She is a graduate of the University of Reading in England and holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley.
Nergis Mavalvala is the Curtis and Kathleen Marble Professor of Astrophysics and associate chair of the department of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A 2010 MacArthur Fellow, Dr. Mavalvala is a graduate of Wellesley College in Massachusetts and holds a Ph.D. from MIT.
Melissa J. Moore is the Eleanor Eustis Farrington Chair of Cancer Research Professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. She joined the faculty there in 2007 after teaching at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. Dr. Moore is a graduate of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, and holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Karen E. Nelson is a professor of human genomic medicine and president of the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, Maryland. She is a graduate of the University of the West Indies and holds a Ph.D. from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
Jodi M. Nunnari is a professor of molecular and cellular biology at the University of California, Davis. She is a graduate of the College of Wooster in Ohio and earned a Ph.D. in pharmacology at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Amy C. Rosenzweig, is the Weinberg Family Distinguished Professor of Life Sciences, professor of molecular biosciences, and professor of chemistry at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. She is a graduate of Amherst College in Massachusetts and holds a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Karen C. Seto is a professor in the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. She has taught at Yale since 2008 and previously was on the faculty at Stanford University. Professor Seto is a graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara and holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. from Boston University.
Sarah Tishkoff is the David and Lyn Silfen University Professor in the departments of genetics and biology at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. She is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in genetics from Yale University.
Anne M. Villeneuve is a professor of developmental biology at the Stanford University School of Medicine in California. She is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame in Indiana and holds a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Rachel I. Wilson is the Martin Family Professor of Basic Research in the Field of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School. She is a graduate of Harvard University and holds a Ph.D. in neuroscience from the University of California, San Francisco.
Junying Yuan is the Elizabeth D. Hay Professor of Cell Biology at Harvard Medical School. She has taught there since 1996. Dr. Yuan is a graduate of Fudan University in China. She earned a Ph.D. in neuroscience at Harvard University.