APS Member History

1	Name:	Dr. J. Craig Venter
	Institution:	J. Craig Venter Institute; Synthetic Genomics, Inc.
	Year Elected:	2013
	Class:	2. Biological Sciences
	Subdivision:	207. Genetics
	Residency:	Resident
	Living? :	Living
	Birth Date:	1946

	J. Craig Venter, Ph.D., is regarded as one of the leading scientists of the 21st century for his numerous invaluable contributions to genomic research. He is Founder, Chairman, and CEO of the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), a not-for-profit, research organization with approximately 300 scientists and staff dedicated to human, microbial, plant, synthetic and environmental genomic research, and the exploration of social and ethical issues in genomics. Dr. Venter is also Founder and CEO of Synthetic Genomics Inc (SGI), a privately held company dedicated to commercializing genomic-driven solutions to address global needs such as new sources of energy, new food and nutritional products, and next generation vaccines. Dr. Venter began his formal education after a tour of duty as a Navy Corpsman in Vietnam from 1967 to 1968. After earning both a Bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry and a Ph.D. in Physiology and Pharmacology from the University of California at San Diego, he was appointed professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo and the Roswell Park Cancer Institute. In 1984, he moved to the National Institutes of Health campus where he developed Expressed Sequence Tags or ESTs, a revolutionary new strategy for rapid gene discovery. In 1992 Dr. Venter founded The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR, now part of JCVI), a not-for-profit research institute, where in 1995 he and his team decoded the genome of the first free-living organism, the bacterium Haemophilus influenzae, using his new whole genome shotgun technique. In 1998, Dr. Venter founded Celera Genomics to sequence the human genome using new tools and techniques he and his team developed. This research culminated with the February 2001 publication of the human genome in the journal, Science. He and his team at Celera also sequenced the fruit fly, mouse and rat genomes. Dr. Venter and his team at JCVI continue to blaze new trails in genomics. They have sequenced and analyzed hundreds of genomes, and have published numerous important papers covering such areas as environmental genomics, the first complete diploid human genome, and the groundbreaking advance in creating the first self- replicating bacterial cell constructed entirely with synthetic DNA. Dr. Venter is one of the most frequently cited scientists, and the author of more than 250 research articles. He is also the recipient of numerous honorary degrees, public honors, and scientific awards, including the 2008 United States National Medal of Science, the 2002 Gairdner Foundation International Award, the 2001 Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize and the King Faisal International Award for Science. Dr. Venter is a member of numerous prestigious scientific organizations including the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Society for Microbiology. J. Craig Venter was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2013.

2	Name:	Dr. Susan R. Wessler
	Institution:	University of California, Riverside; National Academy of Sciences
	Year Elected:	2013
	Class:	2. Biological Sciences
	Subdivision:	207. Genetics
	Residency:	Resident
	Living? :	Living
	Birth Date:	1953

	Susan Wessler is currently University of California President’s Chair at the University of California Riverside and the Home Secretary of the National Academy of Sciences; the first woman to hold this position. She is a molecular geneticist known for her contributions to the field of transposon biology, specifically on the roles of plant transposable elements in gene and genome evolution. Her laboratory has pioneered the use of computational and experimental analyses in the identification of actively transposing elements. She received her Ph.D. in 1980 in Biochemistry from Cornell University. As a postdoctoral fellow of the American Cancer Society at the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Baltimore (1980-82) she was involved in the molecular isolation of the Ac and Ds transposable elements that were first discovered by Barbara McClintock almost 40 years earlier in maize. She began her career at the University of Georgia in 1983 where she remained until moving to UC Riverside in 2010. Wessler has contributed extensively to educational initiatives, including co-authorship of the widely used genetics textbook, Introduction to Genetic Analysis. As a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor (2006), she adapted her research program for the classroom by developing the Dynamic Genome Courses where incoming freshman can experience the excitement of scientific discovery. She is the recipient of several awards including the the inaugural Distinguished Scientist Award (2007) from the Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA), the Stephen Hales Prize (2011) from the American Society of Plant Biologists, and the Excellence in Science Award from FASEB (2012). She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences (1998), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2007), the Royal Society (2017), and was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2013.

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