Rate My Professor Michael Laub

Michael T. Laub is the Salvador E. Luria Professor of Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He earned a BS in Molecular Biology from the University of California, San Diego in 1997 and a PhD from Stanford University in 2002. Laub’s research focuses on the biological mechanisms and evolution of cellular information processing, using bacteria as a model system to examine how cells regulate growth and proliferation in response to environmental changes. His laboratory investigates signaling pathways, toxin-antitoxin systems, and antiphage defense mechanisms, with implications for understanding bacterial virulence and potential applications in phage therapy.

Laub joined the MIT faculty as an assistant professor and advanced to associate professor before his current appointment. He was named an HHMI Early Career Scientist in 2009, received the NSF Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers in 2010, and became an HHMI Investigator in 2015. In 2025, he was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for his contributions to bacterial information processing. His work has appeared in leading journals including Nature, Science, and Cell Reports, with recent publications addressing phage-bacteria interactions and bacterial immune systems. Laub maintains an active research program through the Laub Lab at MIT and contributes to the broader scientific community through his roles in systems biology and molecular microbiology.