OEB News

NAS medal The National Academy of Sciences presents awards annually that honor outstanding achievement in science. Two OEB faculty members are among the honorees for 2012. Andrew Knoll is the recipient of the Mary Clark Thompson Medal. Jonathan Losos is the recipient of the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal. Read more about OEB's NAS award recipients. Also read article about 2012 awards in Harvard Gazette, Dec. 1, 2011.
Gonzalo GiribetNed Friedman's freshman seminar students re-created 10 of Darwin's experiments over the semester, including one that showed that worms do not hear music or anything else. Article in Harvard Gazette, Dec. 1, 2011.
pigeonsAndrew Biewener and colleagues at the Concord Field Station published research in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showing that the common city pigeon, Columba livia, uses a technique similar to a helicopter's to negotiate low-speed tight aerial turns.
Fuzz CromptonA.W. (Fuzz) Crompton, OEB Professor Emeritus, was awarded the 2011 Romer-Simpson Medal of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. The society's highest award honors sustained and outstanding scholarly excellence in the discipline of vertebrate paleontology. SVP Announcement
ColumbineResearch by Elena Kramer finds that columbine flowers adapt their shape to match pollinators' tongues, causing dramatic diversity. Article in Harvard Gazette, Nov. 17, 2011.

OEB Faculty Spotlight

OEB Strategic Partners

The Broad Institute is a research collaboration of MIT and Harvard, created to bring the power of genomics to medicine. Colleen Cavanaugh, Dan Hartl, Maryellen Ruvolo, and Pardis Sabetiare associate members of the institute.

Visit the Institute's website

OEB Research in Focus:


Current Research Areas


Groundbreaking research in the life sciences is now more interdisciplinary than ever and it is often the case that OEB faculty work in more than one of these areas.

Undergraduate Study

undergrad student with wolves
The OEB concentration provides opportunities for students to study biological diversity in the field, whether close to home or abroad.

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Graduate Program


OEB Graduate students participate in collaborative forefront research in their chosen area of study.

How to apply