Bonnie Bassler Awarded the National Medal of Science

Arati Prabhakar, Ph.D., Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), awards Bonnie L. Bassler the National Medal of Science during an awards ceremony at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, DC, January 3, 2025. Photo by Ryan K. Morris

Theobald Smith Society Lifetime member and 2003 Waksman Honorary Lecturer Bonnie Bassler has been awarded the highest recognition the nation can bestow on scientists: The National Medal of Science.  Princeton’s Bonnie Bassler was instrumental in founding a new branch of science centered on quorum sensing, the process by which bacteria communicate with one another and orchestrate collective tasks.  Check out this news article about her and her work: https://www.hhmi.org/news/tapping-bacterial-conversations