Barbara Schaal

Barbara A. Schaal is the Mary-Dell Chilton Distinguished Professor of Biology and Professor of Environmental Studies by courtesy appointment in the Department of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis. She received her BS degree with honors in Biology from the University of Illinois at Chicago and her MS and PhD in population biology from Yale University in 1974. A pioneering figure in plant evolutionary biology, Schaal was among the first plant scientists to employ molecular biology-based approaches to investigate evolutionary processes. Her research specializes in the evolutionary genetics of plants, molecular evolution of genes, systematics, and quantitative genetics. She has examined genetic structure, population differentiation, gene flow, and domestication in crop species including rice, cassava, wild bananas, Solanum pimpinellifolium, Spondias purpurea, and Oryza rufipogon.

Schaal began her academic career on the faculties of the University of Houston and Ohio State University before joining Washington University in St. Louis in 1980 as Associate Professor of Biology, advancing to full Professor in 1986. She chaired the Department of Biology, directed the Tyson Research Center, and served as Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences from 2013 to 2020, overseeing academic, financial, and administrative operations. In professional leadership, she presided over the Botanical Society of America, the Society for the Study of Evolution, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2016. Schaal was Vice President of the National Academy of Sciences for eight years (2005–2013), the first woman in that role, chaired the Division on Earth and Life Studies at the National Research Council, and served on President Barack Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology from 2009 to 2017. Appointed a U.S. science envoy by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, she joined the board of the Supporters of Agricultural Research Foundation in 2019. Her honors include election to the National Academy of Sciences, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and American Philosophical Society in 2023, as well as the National Science Board Public Service Medal in 2019. Key publications encompass "Domestication of a Mesoamerican cultivated fruit tree, Spondias purpurea" (PNAS, 2005), "Phylogeography of Asian wild rice, Oryza rufipogon reveals multiple independent domestications of cultivated rice, Oryza sativa" (PNAS, 2006), "Population structure of wild bananas, Musa balbisiana, in China determined by SSR fingerprinting and cpDNA PCR-RFLP" (Molecular Ecology, 2005), and "Plants and people: Our shared history and future" (Plants, People, Planet, 2019). Schaal’s contributions have profoundly shaped conservation genetics, agrobiodiversity, and science policy.

Professional Email: schaal@wustl.edu