Jennifer Doudna

Jennifer Doudna is a biochemist who revolutionized biochemistry and medicine. While she was born in Washington DC on February 19, 1964, Doudna grew up in Hilo, Hawaii and was fascinated by Hawaiian culture, the beauty of the island, and its tropical, exotic nature.

Doudna studied at Pomona College in Claremont, California, graduating in 1985 with a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry. She attended Harvard Medical School for her doctoral study, majoring in biochemistry and molecular pharmacology, and earning her PhD in 1989. In 2002, Doudna accepted a position at the University of California, Berkeley as a biochemistry and molecular biology professor. 

Her contributions to biochemistry, genetics, and the medical field are vast and profound, earning her dozens of awards. A few of her contributions include founding Intellia Therapeutics and Editas Medicine, as well as revolutionizing genetics by developing a method to edit genomes. The latter won her a Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2020. Doudna also earned the Wolf Prize in Medicine in 2020, was a co-recipient of the Gruber Prize in Genetics in 2015, and was named one of the Time 100 Most Influential People in 2015.