Board of Directors
Dr. Robert Dorit is an Associate Professor of Biology at Smith College. He received his B.A. in Human Biology and M.E. in Environmental Engineering at Stanford University, and he received his M.A. and Ph.D. in Organismal and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. Dr. Dorit's lab is broadly concerned with experimental, retrospective and computational approaches to molecular evolution. There are three on-going projects that Dr. Dorit pursues. The first addresses resistance in antimicrobial design, which employs in vitro engineering approaches and large-scale screening to engineer antimicrobial toxins for use against enteric pathogens. He also studies in vivo experimental evolution by "re-evolving" RNase P RNA. Finally, Dr. Dorit is investigating the genetic dynamics of the seed bank in a weed species, Stellaria media. Dr. Dorit is a founder and CEO of Origin Antimicrobials LLC, a biopharmacuetical start-up company focused on generating novel antimicrobials.
Dr. Jonathan King is a Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He received his B.S. at Yale University in Zoology and his Ph.D. at Cal Tech in Genetics. Dr. King's research interests include virus assembly, protein folding, and misfolding. Dr. King is also currently organizing the Massachusetts Darwin 2009 Bicentennial Project.
Dr. Sassanfar received her B.S. and M.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris and her Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Cornell University. Dr. Mandana is the Director of the Massachusetts Junior Academy of Sciences. She has extensive research experience in both academia and industry, where she spent four years working on the discovery of novel antimicrobial targets. Dr. Sassanfar's scientific interests are focused on two main areas: DNA repair and mutagenesis, and small RNAs. She is particularly interested in tRNAs that play a fundamental role in protein translation. tRNAs are small (~76-bases long), and yet each tRNA molecule interacts with a battery of proteins involved in such varied processes as tRNA modification, tRNA processing, tRNA aminoacylation, translation initiation or elongation, and the ribosome. In fact, any given tRNA molecule interacts with at least 15 different proteins, some yet uncharacterized! Dr. Sassanfar's other interests are high school and college science outreach. She organizes and lead various programs that focus on science teachers training, curriculum development, hands-on activities for high school students, and volunteer work with area high schools. In addition Dr. Sassanfar oversees a summer research internship program in biology for undergraduates from other institutions at MIT. She is also co-Master of Winthrop house and has the tremendous privilege of living among Harvard undergraduates.
Ms. Susan Walters received her Bachelor's Degree from UMass/Boston, and obtained her law degree from the New England School of Law in Boston. She is a member of the Massachusetts Bar, and worked as a divorce mediator for several years. Since then she has been devoted to raising her two sons, Alex and Nick, with her husband Rick. Rick and Susan are committed to supporting worthy causes when they are able to.
Professor Watt is the President and Trustee of the California Academy of Sciences and Professor and Director of the Center for Evolutionary Studies, Stanford University. He received his B.A. in Zoology, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in biology all at Yale University. Dr. Watt's research focuses on the development of evolutionary theory from mechanistic viewpoints. His studies employ techniques ranging from biochemistry and wind tunnel flight biophysics to field ecology and mathematical population genetics and address biochemical and physiological mechanisms of genetic variation, ecological niche structure as the source of natural-selective pressures, and the resulting patterns of evolution of metabolic organization.
