June 30, 2025
UW computational neuroscientist and physicist among newly elected National Academy of Sciences members
Two University of Washington faculty members have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences:
- Adrienne Fairhall, professor of neurobiology and biophysics, and adjunct professor of applied mathematics
- David Hertzog, Arthur B. McDonald Professor of Physics and director at the Center for Experimental Nuclear Physics and Astrophysics
Fairhall and Hertzog are among 120 new members and 30 international members elected “in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research,” announced April 29 by the Academy. Chartered in 1863, the National Academy of Sciences provides policy advice and input to governmental, nonprofit and private organizations.
Adrienne FairhallJ. Garner Photography
Fairhall’s group at UW Medicine develops theoretical approaches to understand how nervous systems process information. She collaborates with experimental labs across the UW, examining information processing in systems that range from single neurons — nerve cells that receive and conduct signals — to neural networks. She’s studied how mosquitoes use heat and chemical cues to forage, and how neural inputs drive muscle activation and biomechanics in hydra — tiny, tentacled invertebrates that live in water.
Fairhall grew up in Australia. She completed her master’s and Ph.D. in physics at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. She was a postdoctoral scholar at Princeton University before joining the UW School of Medicine faculty in 2004. Among Fairhall’s honors and awards are a Sloan Fellowship, a Burroughs Wellcome “Careers at the Scientific Interface” Fellowship and a McKnight Scholar Award. She was named an Allen Institute Distinguished Investigator. In 2022, she was Fulbright-Tocqueville Distinguished Chair at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris.
David Hertzog
Hertzog leads the UW Precision Muon Physics Group, a research group that has designed and constructed detectors for high-precision experiments with muons — similar to electrons, but about 200 times more massive — conducted at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago. The UW team also has led efforts to analyze the massive amounts of data produced in that experiment, known as the Muon g-2 experiment.
The overarching goal is to test the Standard Model — a theory to describe how the universe works at its most fundamental level. Studying the behavior of muons may help determine whether muons are interacting solely with known particles and forces, or if unknown particles or forces exist.
Hertzog completed his Ph.D. in physics at The College of William & Mary. Following time at Carnegie-Mellon University and the University of Illinois, he joined the UW as a professor in 2010. He’s served on numerous scientific advisory committees and panels and is coauthor of more than 200 papers and technical reports. He has mentored or co-mentored more than 20 Ph.D. students and 15 postdoctoral researchers.
With this year’s additions, the National Academy of Sciences now has 2,662 active members and 556 international members.
Tag(s): Adrienne Fairhall • College of Arts & Sciences • David Hertzog • Department of Applied Mathematics • Department of Neurobiology & Biophysics • Department of Physics • UW Medicine