Two Berkeley Lab Scientists Named AAAS Fellows

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has announced their 2024 Fellows, including two scientists from the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). This lifetime honor, which follows a nomination and review process, recognizes scientists, engineers, and innovators for their distinguished achievements toward the advancement or applications of science.

AAAS, founded in 1848, is the world’s largest general scientific society. The 2024 Fellows class includes 471 scientists, engineers, and innovators spanning 24 scientific disciplines who are being recognized for their scientifically and socially distinguished achievements.

The Berkeley Lab honorees are:

Nigel Mouncey, director of the DOE Joint Genome Institute, was elected for distinguished contributions to the field of genomics and leadership in development of advanced integrative genome science capabilities.

Mouncey also heads the Secondary Metabolites Program at the JGI that is developing large-scale innovative approaches to study regulation and biosynthesis of secondary metabolites. Mouncey became president of the Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (SIMB) in 2023, and served a three-year term on their board of directors. He was named a SIMB Fellow in 2024 and received the Charles Porter Award in 2021. He is an inventor on 13 patents.

Phillip Messersmith, a faculty senior scientist in the Materials Sciences Division, has been recognized for his distinguished contributions to the field of bioinspired materials and adhesives, particularly for pioneering work on mussel-inspired adhesive materials for biomedical applications.

Messersmith’s groundbreaking research has led to significant advances in tissue adhesives, drug delivery systems, and medical implant coatings. An inventor on more than 45 patents, Messersmith is also the Class of 1941 Professor in the Departments of Bioengineering and Materials Science and Engineering, and Chair of the Department of Bioengineering at UC-Berkeley. His exceptional contributions have been recognized with numerous honors, including a MERIT award from NIH and the Langmuir Lecture Award from the American Chemical Society.

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Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) is committed to groundbreaking research focused on discovery science and solutions for abundant and reliable energy supplies. The lab’s expertise spans materials, chemistry, physics, biology, earth and environmental science, mathematics, and computing. Researchers from around the world rely on the lab’s world-class scientific facilities for their own pioneering research. Founded in 1931 on the belief that the biggest problems are best addressed by teams, Berkeley Lab and its scientists have been recognized with 16 Nobel Prizes. Berkeley Lab is a multiprogram national laboratory managed by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

DOE’s Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit energy.gov/science.