Mohamed Noor has been named dean of the natural sciences for Trinity College of Arts and Sciences.
Professor of biology and Darwin-Wallace Medal recipient, Noor will replace Daniel Kiehart, professor of biology, effective July 1, 2019. Kiehart served two terms, the first of which began in 2013.
"As I'll be new to this job, it'll be essential first to find out the priorities of the units with which I'll be working so as to see how best to help," Noor wrote in an email to The Chronicle. "I'm especially keen on initiatives that aim to improve the experiences of and training for our graduate student population and to promote greater interaction among research groups."
Noor won the Darwin-Wallace award—one presented on Charles Darwin's 200th birthday in 2009 and that hadn't been issued in 50 years—for studying how species form. Noor told The Chronicle that when he received the letter notifying him he won, he almost threw it away—he thought it was spam. A quick Google search proved otherwise.
"It was very flattering," Noor said. "Especially when they then asked me to give a speech at The Linnean Society—at the same place where Darwin had given his famous speech. Like why? Why me? Very flattering."
Noor was the chair of biology from 2013 to 2017. He has also served as the president of the American Genetic Association and has won several awards from Duke.
“My initial duty in the new role will be to hear all the priorities of our natural sciences departments to learn how to best help them meet their goals,” Noor said in the news release. “I'm especially keen on initiatives that aim to improve the experiences of and training for our graduate student population and to promote greater interaction among research groups.”
Noor has also published two books, his latest entitled "Live Long and Evolve: What Star Trek Can Teach Us about Evolution, Genetics and Life on Other Worlds."
"What I love about Star Trek is that—through all the series, you can see this with the quotes in the beginning about seeking out new life—it is very much advocating basic science," Noor told The Chronicle. "It’s very much advocating ‘we don’t know something, we want to go explore, we want to go understand it.’ And that’s something that’s a little bit rare."
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Managing Editor 2018-19, 2019-2020 Features & Investigations Editor
A member of the class of 2020 hailing from San Mateo, Calif., Ben is The Chronicle's Towerview Editor and Investigations Editor. Outside of the Chronicle, he is a public policy major working towards a journalism certificate, has interned at the Tampa Bay Times and NBC News and frequents Pitchforks.