Commission Membership

Miriam Goodman, PhD
Professor of Molecular and Cellular Physiology

Bio

Miriam B. Goodman is Professor and Chair of Molecular and Cellular Physiology. Professor Goodman holds the Mrs. George A. Winzer Chair in Cell Biology and is the founding director of the Wu Tsai Neuroscience Institute Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Scholars Program. Entering its seventh year, this program supports a diverse cohort of scholars in neuroscience. She holds an Sc.B. from Brown University and a PhD from The University of Chicago. Professor Goodman also received the Eppendorf and Science Magazine Prize in Neuroscience, a Sloan Foundation Award, and the Michael and Kate Bárány Award of the Biophysical Society.

Professor Goodman’s scholarship focuses on sensory biology and the sense of touch, which is the first sense to develop and the last to fade. Her multidisciplinary research team of biologists, physicists, and engineers, investigates the molecular events underpinning touch, the mechanics of force transfer, the genetics of mechanical neuroprotection, and the degradation of touch sensation by anti-cancer drugs as well as developing novel technologies to support these research objectives.

In addition to leading her research team, Professor Goodman is a passionate educator and advocate for diversity, inclusion, and equity in the academy. In support of these goals, she developed a short course on this topic for scientists that has served as an incubator for programs designed by and designed for underrepresented graduate students. Her work in these arenas has been recognized by awards for excellence in graduate education and in diversity and inclusion from Stanford and by the Landis Outstanding Mentorship Award from the National Institutes of Health.