Joanna Aizenberg

A bioengineer learns from sponges...

Joanna Aizenberg

When Joanna Aizenberg looks at the skeleton of a sea sponge lying on her desk, she sees more than an oddly shaped tube. “The sponge makes this nearly perfect glass structure,” she says. “Almost every construction principle that we use is used by nature here, but on a scale 1,000 times smaller.” Aizenberg, who is Gordon McKay professor of materials science and Susan S. and Kenneth L. Wallach professor at the Radcliffe Institute, where she will be a fellow this fall, puts the design principles she sees in nature—in sponges, rocks, and sea urchins—to human ends. For instance, the brittle star (a relative of the starfish) can change the pigment of its crystal optical lens like a pair of light-sensitive sunglasses. By mimicking its design, Aizenberg invented a synthetic lens that she could tune to certain wavelengths of light. Her research draws on chemistry, biology, engineering, and math, the last of which she has excelled at since childhood. While growing up in Russia, she won mathematical Olympiads and precociously sent problems of her own devising to a popular science magazine. Unfortunately, the Russian educational system discouraged exploration beyond her chosen field of physical chemistry. She found more freedom while earning her Ph.D. in structural biology at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel—where her fascination with crystalline structures in sea life began—and as a postdoctoral student at Harvard. She returned to Harvard in 2007 after several years at Bell Labs, where working with students serving summer fellowships convinced her that she wanted to teach full time. She has also lectured at the New York School of Design, where she tells students that they can find everything they study in nature. Even in a sea sponge.

You might also like

Five Questions with Javier Ortega-Hernández

A professor of evolutionary biology on what shaped life more than 500 million years ago

Five Questions with Peter R. Girguis

A Harvard professor of evolutionary biology on what lurks in the deep sea  

How AI Is Reshaping Supply Chains

Harvard Kennedy School lecturer on using AI to strengthen supply chains

Most popular

Harvard art historian Jennifer Roberts teaches the value of immersive attention

Teaching students the value of deceleration and immersive attention

The Truth About Imposter Syndrome

Thoughts on a perennial undergraduate complaint

Explore More From Current Issue

Man splashing water on his face at outdoor fountain beside woman holding cup near stone building.

Why Heat Waves Make You Miserable

Scientists are studying how much heat and humidity the human body can take.

Renaissance portrait of young man thought to be Christoper Marlowe with light beard, wearing ornate black coat with gold buttons and red patterns.

Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival

Without Christopher Marlowe, there might not have been a Bard.

Julie Riew, wearing a white dress, playing guitar and singing into a microphone on stage.

Bringing Korean Stories to Life

Composer Julia Riew writes the musicals she needed to see.