Eve Marder

Eve Marder is the Victor and Gwendolyn Beinfield University Professor at Brandeis University.  B.A, Brandeis University,1969. Ph.D., University of California, San Diego, 1974. Postdoctoral research, University of Oregon and the Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, France. She assumed her faculty position in 1978.  Marder was President of the Society for Neuroscience (2008), and on the NINDS Council, National Academy of Sciences Council, numerous Study Sections, and Advisory Boards for institutions in the USA and abroad.  Marder is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and Fellow of the Biophysical Society, the American Physiological Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.  She received the Miriam Salpeter Award for Women in Neuroscience, the W.F. Gerard Prize from the Society for Neuroscience, the George A. Miller Award from the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, the Karl Spencer Lashley Prize from the American Philosophical Society, Honorary Doctorates from Bowdoin College, Tel Aviv University, and Princeton University, the Gruber Award in Neuroscience, the Education Award from the Society for Neuroscience, the Kavli Award in Neuroscience. and the National Academy of Sciences Award in Neuroscience.  Marder served on the NIH working group for the Obama BRAIN Initiative, and is on the BRAIN advisory Council.  Marder has served on many journal editorial boards.  She was Editor-in Chief of Journal of Neurophysiology, and was Senior and Deputy Editor at eLife for its first 6 years.  

Marder studies the dynamics of small neuronal networks, and her work was instrumental in demonstrating that neuronal circuits are not “hard-wired” but can be reconfigured by neuromodulatory neurons and substances to produce a variety of outputs.  She combines experimental work with insights from modeling and theoretical studies. With Larry Abbott, her lab developed the programmable dynamic clamp.  Her lab pioneered studies of homeostatic regulation of intrinsic membrane properties, and stimulated work on the mechanisms by which brains remain stable while allowing for change during development and learning.  Marder now studies how similar network performance can arise from different sets of underlying network parameters, with its relevance for differential resilience in the population.  

In addition to her original research papers, Marder has published numerous extremely influential review articles which are heavily cited. Additionally, she has published more than 20 short essays relevant to the life of scientists, senior and junior. She has long been an advocate for women, diversity and international representation.   Her life was highlighted in a recent book by Charlotte Nassim, MIT Press, 2018 Lessons from the Lobster, Eve Marder’s Work in Neuroscience.