Joan L. Slonczewski received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr College and her Ph.D. in Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry from Yale University, where she studied bacterial motility with Robert M. Macnab. After postdoctoral work at the University of Pennsylvania, she went on to teach undergraduate microbiology at Kenyon College, where she has earned a Silver Medal in the National Professor of the Year program of the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education. She has published numerous research articles with undergraduate coauthors on bacterial pH regulation and is the author of five science fiction novels, including A Door into Ocean, which earned the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. She served as At-large Member representing Divisions on the Council Policy Committee of the American Society for Microbiology and is a member of the Editorial Board of the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.