56 Notable alumni of Rockefeller University
Updated: June 22, 2026 EliteDegrees
Rockefeller University is ranked #475 in the world and #150 in United States by aggregated alumni prominence. Below is the list of 56 notable alumni from Rockefeller University sorted by their wiki pages popularity. The directory includes famous graduates and former students along with research and academic staff. Many individuals affiliated with Rockefeller University won Nobel Prizes for Peace, in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, and Economics.
1. Jessica R. Barson
neuroscientist
Jessica Barson is an American neuroscientist and associate professor at Drexel University College of Medicine. Barson investigates neuropeptide signalling in the paraventricular nucleus of the thalamus as well as the nucleus accumbens to understand the neurobiological basis of addiction and elucidate targets for therapy.
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2. Erik van Nimwegen
1970-. (aged 56)
university teacher
Erik van Nimwegen is a Dutch computational biologist and Professor at the Biozentrum of the University of Basel, Switzerland.
3. Marius Sudol
1954-. (aged 72)
biologist
Marius Sudol is an American molecular and cellular biologist. He was born in 1954 in Tarnow, Poland. In 1978, he immigrated to the United States to study at The Rockefeller University in New York City, where he received his Ph.D. in 1983. He is currently an Adjunct Faulty at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in NYC.
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4. Nina Papavasiliou
biologist
immunologist
Nina Papavasiliou is an immunologist and Helmholtz Professor in the Division of Immune Diversity at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg, Germany. She is also an adjunct professor at the Rockefeller University, where she was previously associate professor and head of the Laboratory of Lymphocyte Biology. She is best known for her work in the fields of DNA and...
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5. Hazel Sive
1956-. (aged 70)
university teacher
biologist
Hazel L. Sive is a South African-born research pioneer, award-winning educator, and innovator in the higher education space. She is Dean of the College of Science and Mathematics at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and Professor of Biology. From 2020-2025, she was Dean of the College of Science at Northeastern University, Boston. Prior to June 2020, she was a Member...
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6. Mandë Holford
diplomat
researcher
chemist
Mandë Holford is Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University and Curator of Malacology in Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. She was formerly a professor in chemistry at Hunter College with scientific appointments at the American Museum of Natural History and Weill Cornell Medical College. Her interdisciplinary research covering 'mollusks to medicine' spans chemistry and biology and aims...
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7. Bruce R. Korf
1944-. (aged 82)
physician
researcher
geneticist
Bruce Richard Korf is a medical geneticist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. In April 2009, he began a two-year term as president of the American College of Medical Genetics (ACMG), a professional organization.
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8. Linda-Gail Bekker
1962-. (aged 64)
university teacher
HIV/AIDS activist
physician
Linda-Gail Bekker MBChB, DTMH, DCH, FCP is a professor of Medicine and Chief Executive Officer of the Desmond Tutu Health Foundation. She is also Director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Centre at the University of Cape Town. She is a Past President of the International AIDS Society (2016–18).
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9. M. R. C. Greenwood
1943-. (aged 83)
academic administrator
Mary Rita Cooke Greenwood is an American academic and nutritionist.
10. Marina Picciotto
1963-. (aged 63)
neuroscientist
researcher
Marina Rachel Picciotto is an American neuroscientist known for her work on the role of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in addiction, memory, and reward behaviors. She is the Charles B. G. Murphy Professor of Psychiatry and professor in the Child Study Center and the Departments of Neuroscience and of Pharmacology at the Yale University School of Medicine. She was named Director...
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11. Cheng-Ming Chuong
1952-. (aged 74)
university teacher
pathologist
researcher
paleontologist
ornithologist
Cheng-Ming Chuong is a Taiwanese-American physician-scientist specializing in biomedical science. He is a professor of pathology at the University of Southern California and an academician of Academia Sinica in Taiwan.
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12. Anthony Cerami
1940-. (aged 86)
biochemist
Anthony Cerami is an American entrepreneur and medical research scientist.
13. Amos Smith
1944-2025 (aged 81)
chemist
Amos Brittain Smith III was an American chemist and academic who was a professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
14. Olaf Sporns
1963-. (aged 63)
university teacher
teacher
psychologist
opinion journalist
neuroscientist
Olaf Sporns is Provost Professor in Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University and scientific co-director of the university's Network Science Institute. He is the founding editor of the academic journal Network Neuroscience, published by MIT Press.
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15. David J. Anderson
1956-. (aged 70)
researcher
neuroscientist
neurobiologist
David Jeffrey Anderson is an American neurobiologist. He is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator. His lab is located at the California Institute of Technology, where he currently holds the position of Seymour Benzer Professor of Biology, TianQiao and Chrissy Chen Leadership Chair and Director, TianQiao and Chrissy Chen Institute for Neuroscience. Anderson is a founding adviser of the Allen...
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16. Prabhjot Singh
1982-. (aged 44)
Prabhjot Singh is an American scientist, physician and healthcare researcher.
17. Daniel W. Stroock
1940-2025 (aged 85)
mathematician
university teacher
Daniel Wyler Stroock was an American mathematician and probabilist.
18. Vanessa Ruta
1974-. (aged 52)
neuroscientist
researcher
Vanessa Julia Ruta is an American neuroscientist known for her work on the structure and function of chemosensory circuits underlying innate and learned behaviors in the fly Drosophila melanogaster. She is the Gabrielle H. Reem and Herbert J. Kayden Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Neurophysiology and Behavior at The Rockefeller University and, as of 2021, an Investigator of...
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19. Nina Fedoroff
1942-. (aged 84)
geneticist
university teacher
Nina Vsevolod Fedoroff is an American molecular biologist known for her research in life sciences and biotechnology, especially transposable elements or jumping genes. and plant stress response. In 2007, President George W. Bush awarded her the National Medal of Science, she is also a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,...
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20. Peter Walter
1954-. (aged 72)
biologist
biochemist
molecular biologist
university teacher
Peter Walter is a German-American molecular biologist and biochemist. He is currently the Director of the Bay Area Institute of Science at Altos Labs and an emeritus professor at the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator until 2022.
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21. Stephen Grossberg
1939-. (aged 87)
university teacher
neuroscientist
mathematician
Stephen Grossberg is a cognitive scientist, theoretical and computational psychologist, neuroscientist, mathematician, biomedical engineer, and neuromorphic technologist. He is the Wang Professor of Cognitive and Neural Systems and a professor emeritus of Mathematics & Statistics, Psychological & Brain Sciences, and Biomedical Engineering at Boston University.
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22. Odile Jacob
1954-. (aged 72)
psychologist
publisher
Odile Jacob is a French publisher who founded Les Éditions Odile Jacob in the middle of the 1980s. She is also a trained scientist, studying the workings of the brain, the mind and thought. She is a member of Le Siècle.
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23. Chang Yi Wang
1951-. (aged 75)
chairperson
entrepreneur
Wang Chang-yi is a Taiwanese biochemist and immunologist. She is the founder of United Biomedical, Inc. (UBI), headquartered in Hauppauge, New York, and its group of companies in Asia.
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24. Bruce McEwen
1938-2020 (aged 82)
neuroscientist
researcher
Bruce Sherman McEwen was an American neuroendocrinologist and head of the Harold and Margaret Milliken Hatch Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology at Rockefeller University. He was known for his work on the effects of environmental and psychological stress, having coined the term allostatic load.
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25. John Howard Northrop
1891-1987 (aged 96)
biochemist
scientist
chemist
university teacher
John Howard Northrop was an American biochemist who, with James Batcheller Sumner and Wendell Meredith Stanley, won the 1946 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. The award was given for these scientists' isolation, crystallization, and study of enzymes, proteins, and viruses. Northrop was a Professor of Bacteriology and Medical Physics, Emeritus, at University of California, Berkeley.
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26. David Albert
1954-. (aged 72)
physicist
philosopher
David Z. Albert is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the MA Program in The Philosophical Foundations of Physics at Columbia University in New York.
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27. Edward Tatum
1909-1975 (aged 66)
geneticist
biochemist
Edward Lawrie Tatum was an American geneticist. He shared half of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958 with George Beadle for showing that genes control individual steps in metabolism. The other half of that year's award went to Joshua Lederberg. Tatum was an elected member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society,...
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28. Herbert Spencer Gasser
1888-1963 (aged 75)
physician
physiologist
psychologist
university teacher
Herbert Spencer Gasser was an American physiologist, and recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1944 for his work with action potentials in nerve fibers while on the faculty of Washington University in St. Louis, awarded jointly with Joseph Erlanger.
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29. Roderick MacKinnon
1956-. (aged 70)
chemist
biophysicist
crystallographer
internist
university teacher
Roderick MacKinnon is an American biophysicist, neuroscientist, and businessman. He is a professor of molecular neurobiology and biophysics at Rockefeller University who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry together with Peter Agre in 2003 for his work on the structure and operation of ion channels.
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30. Seth Lloyd
1960-. (aged 66)
university teacher
physicist
computer scientist
non-fiction writer
engineer
Seth Lloyd is an American quantum information scientist and professor in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Mechanical Engineering.
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31. Robert Bruce Merrifield
1921-2006 (aged 85)
university teacher
biochemist
chemist
Robert Bruce Merrifield was an American biochemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1984 for the invention of solid phase peptide synthesis.
32. Michael W. Young
1949-. (aged 77)
university teacher
chronobiologist
geneticist
Michael Warren Young is an American biologist and geneticist. He has dedicated decades to research studying genetically controlled patterns of sleep and wakefulness within Drosophila melanogaster.
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33. Wendell Meredith Stanley
1904-1971 (aged 67)
virologist
university teacher
writer
chemist
biochemist
Wendell Meredith Stanley was an American biochemist, virologist and Nobel laureate. Stanley's work contributed to lepracidal compounds, diphenyl stereochemistry, and the chemistry of the sterols. His research on the virus causing the mosaic disease in tobacco plants led to the isolation of a nucleoprotein which displayed tobacco mosaic virus activity.
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34. Charles M. Rice
1952-. (aged 74)
researcher
virologist
Charles Moen Rice is an American virologist and Nobel Prize laureate whose main area of research is the hepatitis C virus. He is a professor of virology at the Rockefeller University and an adjunct professor at Cornell University and Washington University School of Medicine. At the time of the award he was a faculty at Rockefeller.
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35. Sally Kornbluth
1961-. (aged 65)
microbiologist
Sally Ann Kornbluth is an American cell biologist, currently serving as the 18th president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology since January 2023. She served as provost of Duke University from July 2014 to December 2022.
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36. Peter J. Hotez
1958-. (aged 68)
writer
vaccinologist
university teacher
pediatrician
Peter Jay Hotez is an American scientist, pediatrician, and advocate in the fields of global health, vaccinology, and neglected tropical disease control. He serves as founding dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine, Professor of Pediatrics and Molecular Virology & Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine, where he is also Director of the Texas Children's Hospital Center for Vaccine...
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37. Rocky Tuan
1951-. (aged 75)
engineer
Rocky Tuan Sung-chi is a Hong Kong medical researcher and bioengineer who served as the vice-chancellor and president of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) from 2018 to 2025. Prior to his vice-chancellorship, Tuan served as distinguished visiting professor and director of the Institute for Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine.
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38. Robert Sapolsky
1957-. (aged 69)
university teacher
biologist
writer
neurologist
neuroscientist
Robert Morris Sapolsky is an American academic, neuroscientist, and primatologist. He is the John A. and Cynthia Fry Gunn Professor at Stanford University and is a professor of biology, neurology, and neurosurgery. Sapolsky's research has focused on neuroendocrinology, particularly relating to stress. He is also a research associate with the National Museums of Kenya.
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39. Alexis Carrel
1873-1944 (aged 71)
biologist
physiologist
sociologist
surgeon
Alexis Carrel was a French surgeon and biologist who spent most of his scientific career in the United States. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1912 for pioneering vascular suturing techniques. He invented the first perfusion pump with Charles Lindbergh opening the way to organ transplantation. In later time however, it was acknowledged that Carrel...
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40. Jeffrey M. Friedman
1954-. (aged 72)
geneticist
university teacher
Jeffrey M. Friedman is a molecular geneticist at New York City's Rockefeller University and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. His discovery of the hormone leptin and its role in regulating body weight has had a major role in the area of human obesity. Friedman is a physician scientist studying the genetic mechanisms that regulate body weight. His...
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41. Paul Greengard
1925-2019 (aged 94)
biochemist
neuroscientist
pharmacologist
university teacher
Paul Greengard was an American neuroscientist best known for his work on the molecular and cellular function of neurons. In 2000, Greengard, Arvid Carlsson and Eric Kandel were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries concerning signal transduction in the nervous system. He was Vincent Astor Professor at Rockefeller University, and served on the Scientific Advisory...
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42. Erich Jarvis
1965-. (aged 61)
neuroscientist
researcher
Erich Jarvis is an American professor at Rockefeller University. He is the head of a team of researchers who study the neurobiology of vocal learning, a critical behavioral substrate for spoken language. By studying animals including songbirds, parrots, and hummingbirds, his research attempts to show that bird groups have similar learning abilities to humans in the context of sound, such...
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43. Harvey Lodish
1941-. (aged 85)
biologist
Harvey Franklin Lodish is a molecular and cell biologist, professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Founding Member of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, and lead author of the textbook Molecular Cell Biology. Lodish's research focused on cell surface proteins and other important areas at the interface between molecular cell biology and medicine.
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44. Barbara Ehrenreich
1941-2022 (aged 81)
immunologist
journalist
essayist
writer
novelist
Barbara Ehrenreich was an American author and political activist. During the 1980s and early 1990s, she was a prominent figure in the Democratic Socialists of America. She was a widely read and award-winning columnist and essayist and the author of 21 books. Ehrenreich was best known for her 2001 book Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, a...
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45. David Baltimore
1938-2025 (aged 87)
virologist
university teacher
geneticist
biochemist
microbiologist
David Baltimore was an American biologist, university administrator, and 1975 Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine. He was a professor of biology at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he served as president from 1997 to 2006. He founded the Whitehead Institute and directed it from 1982 to 1990. In 2008, he served as president of the American Association...
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46. Haldan Keffer Hartline
1903-1983 (aged 80)
biologist
neurologist
physiologist
physician
neuroscientist
Haldan Keffer Hartline ForMemRS was an American physiologist who was a co-recipient (with George Wald and Ragnar Granit) of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in analyzing the neurophysiological mechanisms of vision.
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47. Gerald Edelman
1929-2014 (aged 85)
biologist
chemist
physicist
university teacher
immunologist
Gerald Maurice Edelman was an American biologist who shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work with Rodney Robert Porter on the immune system. Edelman's Nobel Prize-winning research concerned discovery of the structure of antibody molecules. In interviews, he has said that the way the components of the immune system evolve over the life of the individual...
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48. Ralph Steinman
1943-2011 (aged 68)
biologist
researcher
professor
immunologist
physician
Ralph Marvin Steinman was a Canadian physician and medical researcher at Rockefeller University, who in 1973 discovered and named dendritic cells while working as a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Zanvil A. Cohn, also at Rockefeller University. Steinman was one of the recipients of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
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49. Yoshinori Ohsumi
1945-. (aged 81)
biologist
Yoshinori Ohsumi is a Japanese cell biologist specializing in autophagy, the process that cells use to destroy and recycle cellular components.
50. Miriam Adelson
1945-. (aged 81)
publisher
physician
Miriam Adelson is an Israeli-American physician, businesswoman, philanthropist, and conservative political donor. She was married to Sheldon Adelson until his death in 2021.
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51. Rafael Yuste
1963-. (aged 63)
neurobiologist
university teacher
Rafael Yuste is a Spanish–American neurobiologist. He is one of the initiators of the BRAIN Initiative announced in 2013. He is currently a professor at Columbia University.
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52. Günter Blobel
1936-2018 (aged 82)
university teacher
biologist
cell biologist
biochemist
physician
Günter Blobel was a Silesian German and American biologist and 1999 Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology for the discovery that proteins have intrinsic signals that govern their transport and localization in the cell.
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53. Christian de Duve
1917-2013 (aged 96)
chemist
biologist
university teacher
biochemist
physiologist
Christian René Marie Joseph, Viscount de Duve was a Nobel Prize-winning Belgian cytologist and biochemist. He made serendipitous discoveries of two cell organelles, peroxisomes and lysosomes, for which he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1974 with Albert Claude and George E. Palade ("for their discoveries concerning the structural and functional organization of the cell"). In addition...
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54. Karl Landsteiner
1868-1943 (aged 75)
pathologist
university teacher
biologist
physiologist
immunologist
Karl Landsteiner ForMemRS was an Austrian-American biologist, physician, and immunologist. He emigrated with his family to New York in 1923 at the age of 55 for professional opportunities, working for the Rockefeller Institute.
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55. Manuel Elkin Patarroyo Murillo
1946-2025 (aged 79)
immunologist
researcher
pathologist
Manuel Elkin Patarroyo Murillo was a Colombian immunologist, pathologist and academic who was Professor of Pathology and Immunology. He was behind the world's first attempt to create a synthetic vaccine against the protozoal parasite Plasmodium falciparum, the cause of severe malaria, and which is responsible for the death of ~1.5 million people per year in tropical and subtropical regions, including...
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56. Sidarta Ribeiro
1971-. (aged 55)
neuroscientist
biologist
Sidarta Tollendal Gomes Ribeiro is a Brazilian neuroscientist, writer, science communicator, and deputy director of the Brain Institute at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), which he joined in 2008 as full professor.
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