Judith Gabriela Berman is an Israeli molecular geneticist. She is a Professor at Tel Aviv University and Professor Emerita at the University of Minnesota. In her research, she focuses on cellular response mechanisms to drugs and the effects of genetic mutations.
Education Berman completed her Bachelor of Science at Cornell University and received her PhD in biochemistry from the Weizmann Institute of Science.
Career Following her PhD, Berman became an assistant professor in the Deptartment of Plant Biology at the University of Minnesota. She was promoted to Full professor in 2000. As a Full Professor, she was awarded Minnesota's Distinguished McKnight University Professorship in 2008. In 2012, Berman moved her laboratory to Tel Aviv University (TAU) and joined the George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences.
At TAU, Berman led a research team studying drug resistance and tolerance in Candida albicans. In 2013, her team found that under certain conditions, the Candida fungus undergoes sexual reproduction. This method of reproduction creates haploid cells, instead of diploid cells. In 2020, Berman's team collaborated with Markus Ralser and his team at Charité's Institute of Biochemistry to study drug tolerance in invasive fungal pathogens. They specifically investigated the mechanisms by which fungal cells survive exposure to antifungal drugs.
Awards and honors As a Full professor at the University of Minnesota, Berman was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and American Society for Microbiology. She served as a member of the MRC Centre for Medical Mycology’s International Scientific Advisory Board from 2016 to 2023. In 2019, Berman was elected a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization in recognition of her research into drug resistance and tolerance in Candida albicans.
In 2026, Berman was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for her research in the field of microbiology and genetics. She also became the sixth TAU researcher to be elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Personal life Berman and her husband Mike have two children together. In Twin Cities, they were involved in the local Jewish community; their sons attended the Minneapolis Jewish Day School, and the Bermans both served on the boards of local Jewish organizations.
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