Joanna Masel

Joanna Masel is a mathematical modeler and data scientist whose researches foundational questions about how evolution works. These include the population genetic basis for evolvability, applications of evolvability theories to the de novo birth of genes from junk DNA, and subsequent directionality in protein evolution. They also include the puzzle of how populations withstand high rates of deleterious mutation, and the search for general principles to organize the enormous variety of adaptations/goals we observe in nature and tension among them. As well as evolutionary biology, she also dabbles in many other fields from biochemistry to education to economics, and most recently, pandemic tech.