Tim Stearns (born 1961 in Manhasset, New York) is an American scientist and educator. He is a Professor and Dean of the graduate school at The Rockefeller University, where he is Head of the Laboratory of Cellular Dynamics. Stearns was formerly the Frank Lee and Carol Hall Professor in the Department of Biology at Stanford University, with appointments in the Department of Genetics and the Cancer Center in the Stanford Medical School. Stearns served as chair of the Department of Biology at Stanford, 2014-2020, as well as Acting Dean of Research and Senior Associate Vice Provost of Research. He also chaired the 52nd Faculty Senate, 2019-2020. Stearns was an HHMI Professor 2002-2024, and is a member of JASON, a scientific advisory group. He has served on the editorial boards of The Journal of Cell Biology, Genetics and Molecular Biology of the Cell.
Education
Stearns received his B.S. in genetics from Cornell University and did his undergraduate thesis work in the lab of Tom Fox on nuclear control of mitochondrial function in yeast. He received his Ph.D. in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His Ph.D. advisor at MIT was David Botstein, and the title of his thesis was "Genetic analysis of the yeast microtubule cytoskeleton." Stearns' thesis work identified exceptions to the genetic complementation test that were useful for defining genetic interactions and for the first time used the term synthetic lethality in the modern sense of two non-lethal mutations resulting in lethality in the double mutant.Stearns, T. and Botstein, D. "Unlinked noncomplementation: isolation of new conditional-lethal mutations in each of the tubulin genes of Saccharomyces cerevisiae" Genetics (1988) 119:249-260. Stearns credits Botstein with instilling in him a commitment to teaching, and the belief that teaching and research go hand-in-hand.ASCB Profile - Tim Stearns
Professional career
Stearns is known for his work on problems in cell biology and developmental biology, with a focus on the structure and function of the centrosome and cilium of eukaryotic cells. He was a Helen Hay Whitney postdoctoral fellow with Marc Kirschner at UCSF, where he published work on gamma-tubulinStearns, T., Evans, L. and Kirschner, M. "Gamma-tubulin is a highly conserved component of the centrosome" Cell (1990) 65:825-836 and in vitro reconstitution of the centrosome.Stearns, T. and Kirschner, M. "In vitro reconstitution of centrosome assembly and function: the central role of gamma-tubulin" Cell (1994) 76:623-637 Stearns was a faculty member in the Department of Biology at Stanford University 1993-2022, before moving to Rockefeller University. His major research accomplishments include the identification and characterization of new members of the tubulin superfamily of proteins,Chang, P. and Stearns, T. "Delta-tubulin and epsilon-tubulin: two new human centrosomal tubulins reveal new aspects of centrosome structure and function" Nature Cell Biology (2000) 2:30-35Chang, P., Giddings, T.H., Winey, M. and Stearns T. "Epsilon-tubulin is required for centriole duplication and microtubule organization" Nature Cell Biol (2003) 5:71-76Turk, E., Wills, A.A., Kwon, T., Sedzinski, J., Wallingford, J.B. and Stearns, T. (2015) "Zeta-Tubulin Is a Member of a Conserved Tubulin Module and Is a Component of the Centriolar Basal Foot in Multiciliated Cells" Current Biol (2015) 25:2177-2183 elucidation of mechanisms of centrosome duplication,Lacey, K.R., Jackson, P.K. and Stearns, T. "Cyclin-dependent kinase control of centrosome duplication" Proc Natl Acad Sci (1999) 96:2817-2822Wong, C. and Stearns, T. "Centrosome number is controlled by a centrosome-intrinsic block to reduplication" Nature Cell Biol (2003) 5:539-544Tsou, M.F. and Stearns, T. "Mechanism limiting centrosome duplication to once per cell cycle" Nature (2006) 442:947-951 and identification of properties of the primary cilium.Anderson, C.T. and Stearns, T. "Centriole age underlies asynchronous primary cilium growth in mammalian cells" Current Biol (2009) 19:1498-1502Mahjoub, M.R. and Stearns, T. "Supernumerary centrosomes nucleate extra cilia and compromise primary cilium signaling" Current Biol (2012) 22:1628-1634 Stearns served on the NIH NCSD review panel, chairing the panel 2019-21.https://public.era.nih.gov/pubroster/preRosIndex.era?AGENDA=399450&CID=103674
Stearns has also been active in undergraduate and graduate education, being named an HHMI Professor in 2002, and has chaired the Education committees of the American Society for Cell Biology and the Genetics Society of America. He created a pre-grad program at Stanford to train the next generation of leaders in biology research through close interaction with faculty members in course work, research and advising. Stearns taught the Yeast Genetics course at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, and has also taught laboratory workshops in South Africa, Chile, Ghana,http://www.ascb.org/under-a-microscope-in-ghana-the-fifth-west-african-regional-workshop/ and Tanzania.
Stearns is an advisor to the US government on science and technology matters. He was a member of the Defense Science Study Group,https://dssg.ida.org and is a current member of JASON, an independent scientific advisory group to the US that provides expertise on problems related to national security. He served on the Science and Technology Committees of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and SLAC and been a member of working groups for PCAST and the Defense Science Board.
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