Nancy Hopkins, Ph.D.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Geneticist Nancy Hopkins, professor of biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT; Cambridge, MA), has achieved unprecedented success in cloning vertebrate developmental genes by exploiting zebrafish as an ideal model organism. By using insertional mutagenesis, a technique pioneered in invertebrate animals such as Drosophila but long considered impossible to use in vertebrates, Hopkins's laboratory has cloned hundreds of genes that play a role in creating a viable fish embryo. This research has earned her several accolades, including 1998 election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and 1999 election to the Institute of Medicine. Hopkins has gained additional recognition for her revolutionary work on gender equity issues in science, including many awards.

Besides her zebrafish studies, Dr. Hopkins has been captivated in recent years by another academic interest: gender equity in scientific research. During the mid-1990s, she and other tenured female faculty members in science at MIT conducted a wide-ranging study on potential gender biases at the school. The findings were startling: among them, the fact that the School of Science had only 15 tenured women in 1994, compared with 197 tenured men. Women often also held significantly less laboratory space and often earned less pay than their male counterparts did.

In the future, Hopkins would like to take more time outside her zebrafish work to explore again the feasibility of genetics research on behavior, including even gender inequalities in science and other forms of discrimination.