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Board of Governors

This esteemed group of experts helps the Academy effectively advance science for the public good.

Board

Chair

Immediate Past Chair

  • Jerry Hultin, Chair and Co-Founder, Global Futures Group, LLC

Vice-Chair

Treasurer

  • Amber Miller, President, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

President

  • Nicholas B. Dirks, President and Chief Executive Officer, The New York Academy of Sciences

Corporate Secretary

Executive Associate to the Corporate Secretary

Governors

  • Armen Avanessians, Former Head and Chief Investment Officer, Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s (GSAM) Quantitative Investment Strategies Group
  • Serg Bell, Founder and Chairman, Constructor Group, and Founder, Acronis
  • MaryEllen Elia, President, Success for Students, Inc.; former Partner and Senior Fellow, International Center for Leadership in Education; former Commissioner of Education and President of The University of the State of New York
  • Thomas C. Franco, Senior Advisor, Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, LLC
  • Darío Gil, Senior Vice President and Director of IBM Research
  • Stacie Grossman Bloom, Vice Chancellor for Global Research and Innovation, Vice Provost for Research, Chief Research Officer, New York University
  • Aida Habtezion, Chief Medical Officer and Head of Worldwide Medical & Safety, Pfizer Inc.
  • Jerry Hultin, Chair and Co-Founder, Global Futures Group, LLC; Chair Emeritus, The New York Academy of Sciences
  • Seema Kumar, Chief Executive Officer, Cure.; former Global Head – Office of Innovation, Global Health and Scientific Engagement, Johnson & Johnson
  • Ravi Kumar S., Chief Executive Officer, Cognizant​
  • R. May Lee, Co-leader, Guild of Future Architects; Adjunct Professor of “Entrepreneurship and Architecture”, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; former Dean, School of Entrepreneurship and Management, ShanghaiTech University; and former Vice Chancellor, New York University
  • Jim Reddoch, EVP, Investments & CSO, Royalty Pharma
  • John Reed, Executive Vice President, Innovative Medicine, R&D, Johnson & Johnson
  • Lowell Robinson, Corporate Director and Advisor, Barnes & Noble Education
  • Laura Sachar, Managing Partner and Co-Founder, StarVest Partners
  • Konstantin Shakhnovich, Former Global Head of Trading, Citadel Asset Management; former Partner and Global Head of Systematic Market-Making, Goldman Sachs
  • Subra Suresh, President, Global Learning Council; Former President of Carnegie Mellon University, and former Director of the US National Science Foundation
  • Chandrika Tandon, Recognized Business Leader, Grammy Award Winning Artist, and Humanitarian
  • Peter Thorén, Executive Vice President, Access Industries
  • Grace Wang, 17th President of Worcester Polytechnic Institute
  • Jeremy Wertheimer, Chief Executive Officer, Biological Engineering Ventures
  • George D. Yancopoulos, Co-Founder, President and Chief Scientific Officer, Regeneron
  • Michael Young, Nobel Laureate; Richard and Jeanne Fisher Professor and Vice President for Academic Affairs, The Rockefeller University

Life Governors

  • Natarajan Chandrasekaran, Chairman of the Board, Tata Sons
  • Paul Horn, Executive Chair and Founding Partner, Venly; Distinguished Scientist in Residence, New York University; former Senior Vice Provost for Research, New York University; former Senior Vice President and Director of IBM Research
  • Pablo Legorreta, Founder & CEO, Royalty Pharma
  • Torsten Wiesel, Nobel Laureate; President Emeritus and Vincent and Brooke Astor Professor Emeritus, The Rockefeller University; former Secretary-General, Human Frontier Science Program Organization

International Board of Governors

  • Seth F. Berkley, Chief Executive Officer, Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance
  • Gerald Chan, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Morningside Group
  • Alice P. Gast, Former President, Imperial College London, and Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering, Imperial College London
  • S. “Kris” Gopalakrishnan, Co-founder, Infosys; Chairman, Axilor Ventures
  • Toni Hoover, Director, Strategy Planning and Management, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
  • Johan Rockström, Director, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Professor, Earth System Science, University of Potsdam
  • Paul Stoffels, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman, Galapagos NV; Former Chief Scientific Officer, Johnson & Johnson

Emeriti

Chairs Emeriti

  • Jerry Hultin (2019-2024), Chair and Co-Founder, Global Futures Group, LLC
  • Paul Horn (2016-2019), Executive Chair and Founding Partner, Venly; Distinguished Scientist in Residence, New York University; former Senior Vice Provost for Research, New York University; former Senior Vice President and Director of IBM Research
  • Nancy Zimpher (2011-2016), Chancellor Emeritus, The State University of New York
  • John E. Sexton (2007-2011), Former President, New York University
  • Torsten N. Wiesel (2001-2006), Nobel Laureate; President Emeritus and Vincent and Brooke Astor Professor Emeritus, The Rockefeller University; former Secretary-General, Human Frontier Science Program Organization

President Emeritus

  • Ellis Rubinstein, Former President and Chief Executive Officer, The New York Academy of Sciences

President’s Council

  • Peter Agre, Nobel Laureate; University Professor and Director, Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute; Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Bloomberg School of Public Health
  • Richard Axel, Nobel Laureate; University Professor, Columbia University; Investigator, HHMI
  • David Baltimore, Nobel Laureate; Former President, Caltech
  • Etienne-Emile Baulieu, Former President, French Academy of Sciences
  • Len Blavatnik, Founder, Access Industries
  • Irina Bokova, Director General, United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
  • Michael S. Brown, Nobel Laureate; Professor of Molecular Genetics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
  • Linda Buck, Nobel Laureate; Investigator, HHMI; Member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
  • Karen E. Burke, Dermatologist and Research Scientist
  • Thomas R. Cech, Nobel Laureate; Distinguished Professor, University of Colorado Boulder
  • Martin Chalfie, Nobel Laureate; University Professor of Biological Sciences, Columbia University
  • Aaron J. Ciechanover, Nobel Laureate; Distinguished Research Professor, Tumor and Vascular Biology Research Center, Faculty of Medicine, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Israel
  • Kenneth L. Davis, President and CEO of the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City
  • Peter Doherty, Nobel Laureate; Researcher, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (Memphis, TN); Researcher, the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Melbourne
  • Mikael Dolsten, Former President, Worldwide Research and Development; Former Senior Vice-President, Pfizer Inc.
  • Jan Eliasson, Former Deputy Secretary-General to the United Nations
  • Jerome I. Friedman, Nobel Laureate; Institute Professor & Professor of Physics, Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • Joseph Goldstein, Nobel Laureate; Chairman, Molecular Genetics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
  • S. Kris Gopalakrishnan, Chairman, Axilor Ventures / Co-founder Infosys
  • Glenda Greenwald, President, Aspen Brain Forum Foundation
  • William A. Haseltine, President, The Haseltine Foundation for Medical Sciences and the Arts; Chairman, Haseltine Global Health, LLC
  • Hon. Jerry MacArthur Hultin, Senior Presidential Fellow, New York University; President Emeritus, Polytechnic Institute of NYU; Former Under Secretary of the Navy
  • Eric Kandel, Nobel Laureate; Professor, Physiology and Cell Biology, Columbia University
  • Kiyoshi Kurokawa, Former Science Advisor to the Prime Minister of Japan; Professor, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS)
  • Gregory Lucier, Chief Executive Officer, Corza Health
  • Roderick MacKinnon, Nobel Laureate; John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Professor, Rockefeller University; Investigator, HHMI
  • Richard Menschel, Senior Director, Goldman Sachs
  • Ronay Menschel, Chairman of the Board, Phipps Houses; Board of Overseers, Weill Cornell Medical College
  • David K.A. Mordecai, Co-Managing Member, Numerati® Partners LLC, RiskEcon® Lab for Decision Metrics @ Courant Institute for Mathematical Sciences NYU, and Co-Founder, Risk Economics, Inc.
  • John F. Niblack, Former President, Pfizer Global Research & Development
  • Paul Nurse, Nobel Laureate; Former President, The Rockefeller University; Former President, The Royal Society, London; Chief Executive, The Francis Crick Institute
  • Yoshinori Ohsumi, Nobel Laureate; Professor, Institute of Innovative Research, Tokyo Institute of Technology (IIR)
  • Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Nobel Laureate; Former President, the Royal Society
  • Richard Roberts, Nobel Laureate; Chief Scientific Officer, New England Biolabs
  • James E. Rothman, Nobel Laureate; Yale University School of Medicine, Fergus F. Wallace Professor of Cell Biology and Professor of Chemistry; Chairman, Department of Cell Biology; Director, Nanobiology Institute
  • Bengt Samuelsson, Nobel Laureate; Professor, Medical and Physiological Chemistry, Karolinska Institute; Former Chairman, The Nobel Foundation
  • Ismail Serageldin, Director, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, The Library of Alexandria, Egypt
  • Phillip A. Sharp, Nobel Laureate; Director, The McGovern Institute, MIT Center for Cancer Research
  • Feike Sijbesma, CEO/Chairman of the Managing Board, Royal DSM
  • Michael Sohlman, Former Executive Director, The Nobel Foundation
  • Paul Stoffels, Chief Scientific Officer, Johnson & Johnson; Member of the Johnson & Johnson Executive Committee and Management Committee; Worldwide Co-Chairman, Pharmaceuticals Group
  • Jack W. Szostak, Nobel Laureate; Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute; Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School; Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University; Alex A. Rich Distinguished Investigator, Department of Molecular Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital
  • Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Former President, Stanford University
  • Craig B. Thompson, President and CEO, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
  • Shirley Tilghman, President Emerita/Professor of Molecular Biology, Princeton University
  • Frank Walsh, Chief Executive Officer, Ossianix, Inc.
  • George Whitesides, Woodford L. & Ann A. Flowers University Professor, Harvard University
  • Torsten N. Wiesel, Nobel Laureate; Chairman Emeritus, The New York Academy of Sciences; Former Secretary General, Human Frontier Science Program Organization; President Emeritus, Rockefeller University
  • Frank Wilczek, Nobel Laureate; The Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, MIT
  • Ernst-Ludwig Winnacker, Secretary General, Human Frontier Science Program; Former Secretary General, European Research Council; Former President, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Germany
  • Andrew Witty, Former Chief Executive Officer, GlaxoSmithKline
  • Tan Sri Zakri Abdul Hamid, Science Adviser to the Prime Minister of Malaysia
  • Elias Zerhouni, Former Head of Global Research and Development, Sanofi

Board Voices

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Armen Avanessians

Goldman Sachs (ret.)

Engaging young people in the scientific method—observing, building models, testing ideas—helps them gain knowledge, and that excites me most about the Academy.

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Tom Franco

Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, LLC

The Academy’s mission has never been more important, particularly during a time when trust in science can no longer be taken for granted.

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Peter L. Thorén

Access Industries

I have great respect and admiration for what talented scientists can do. The brilliance of science is producing solutions to problems and making the world better. Being a Board member for the Academy enables me to assist in that process in any way I can.

Grace Wang

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

The New York Academy of Sciences looks to the future and continues to empower the next generation of STEM professionals. As the science and technology landscape rapidly evolves, this is particularly an exciting time to be part of the Academy.

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Jerry and Jill Hultin

Global Futures Group, LLC

Jill and I are thrilled to support The New York Academy of Sciences’ renewed drive to create a positive impact and encourage science-informed decision-making to address the most challenging problems of our times.

Board Spotlight