David R. Burgess, PhD Position: Treasurer Current Term: 2008 – 2010

Committee Chair: AAAS Committee, Finance and Budget Committee, Native American Affairs Committee
Committee Member: Awards Committee, Executive Committee, Nominations Committee, Programs Committee

Institution: Boston College
Department: Biology
Position: Professor
Field: Molecular & Cellular Biology
Specialization: Cellular Biology

David R. Burgess, Ph.D., is a Professor of Biology at Boston College and a Past-President of SACNAS. His Cherokee great grandmother was a medicine woman, his father was a teacher and junior high school principal honored for serving minority students and his mother was a homemaker. He was raised in New Mexico and Northern California. His current research, funded by the NIH since 1977, is in the area of cell division and on the science education pipeline for American Indians. He has received several awards including a Research Career Development Award from the NIH and the E. E. Just Award from the American Society for Cell Biology where he was recently elected to Council. He was recently elected Fellow of AAAS.

He has served on numerous national panels, both in basic science review and on study sections whose goal is to increase the diversity of scientists. He serves on the Minority Action Committee of the American Society for Cell Biology. He has presented a number of keynote addresses and lectures to scientific societies, universities and other organizations on his research and in the area of training disparities for minorities in the sciences. He served as a member of the Advisory Committee for the Office of Research on Minority Health at the NIH, the Advisory Committee to the Director at NIH, the NIH National Human Genome Research Institute Advisory Council, the NSF Committee on Equal Opportunity in Science and Engineering and the Biological, and Environmental Research Advisory Committee for the Department of Energy.

To contact the SACNAS Board of Directors email: info@sacnas.org (please include “Board of Directors” in the subject line). For information regarding participation in the leadership of the organization, future SACNAS elections, and nominations procedures, see the elections page.