Sally Ann Kornbluth (born 1960) is an American cell biologist and academic administrator. She began serving as the 18th president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in January 2023.

Early life and education

Kornbluth was born in Paterson, New Jersey, and grew up in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. She is Jewish. Her father George was an accountant and her mother, Marisa Galvany, was an opera singer.

Kornbluth received a Bachelor of Arts with a major in political science from Williams College in 1982 and a Bachelor of Science with a major in genetics from the University of Cambridge, in 1984. She received a Doctor of Philosophy in molecular oncology from the Rockefeller University in 1989.

While at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, she was a Herchel Smith Scholar. She worked at the laboratory of Hidesaburo Hanafusa when at Rockefeller University, and performed postdoctoral training with John Newport at the University of California, San Diego.

Career

Duke University

Kornbluth joined the faculty at Duke University in 1994. Her research focuses on cell growth and programmed cell death and how cancer cells evade apoptosis. She is interested in the role of programmed cell death in regulating the length of female fertility in vertebrates, in a mechanism regulated by caspase-2.

At Duke she received a Research Mentoring award in 2012 and the Distinguished Faculty Award from the Duke Medical Alumni Association in 2013. She was elected to the Institute of Medicine in 2013.

In 2014 Kornbluth became Provost at Duke, the first woman to serve in this role. As Provost, she oversaw a leadership transition in which female Deans became a majority at Duke. She is an advocate of liberal arts education and has stated that her own experience in a liberal arts school at Williams College led her to a career in the sciences. She is also an advocate for on-line learning as a driver of pedagogic innovation.

She also served as Chair of the Board of Trustees at Duke Kunshan University, overseeing the appointment of Al Bloom as the university's Executive Vice Chancellor in 2020, and the launch of the WHU-Duke Research Institute in 2014.

Kornbluth served as provost from 2014 to 2022 and vice dean for basic sciences at Duke University School of Medicine from 2006 to 2014.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

In 2022, Kornbluth was selected as the 18th president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, succeeding L. Rafael Reif in this role in 2023. At her inauguration she outlined objectives for the institute including accelerating work on climate change and strengthening links between engineering and life sciences.

Following the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, Kornbluth and the presidents of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard University were called to testify before a December 2023 congressional hearing about antisemitism on their campuses. When asked by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) whether calls for "genocide of Jews" was harassment under university policies, she responded, "If targeted at individuals, not making public statements." Kornbluth's statement has been described by Stefanik and others as antisemitic, leading to calls by some for Kornbluth's resignation.

Honors

• National Academy of Medicine
• National Academy of Inventors
• American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Personal life

Kornbluth is married to Daniel Lew, a professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at the Duke University School of Medicine. They have two children. Kornbluth is Jewish.