Joanne M. Willey has been a professor at Hofstra University on Long Island, New York, since 1993, where she is the Leo A. Guthart Professor of Biomedical Science and Chair of the Department of Science Education at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell.


Dr. Willey received her B.A. in Biology from the University of Pennsylvania, where her interest in microbiology began with work on cyanobacterial growth in eutrophic streams. She earned her Ph.D. in biological oceanography (specializing
in marine microbiology) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology-Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program in 1987. She then went to Harvard University, where she spent her postdoctoral fellowship studying the filamentous soil bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor. Dr. Willey has coauthored a number of publications that focus on its complex developmental cycle. She is an active member of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), and served on the editorial board of the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology for nine years and as Chair of the Division of General Microbiology. Dr. Willey taught microbiology to biology majors for 20 years and now teaches microbiology and infectious disease to medical students. She has taught courses in cell biology, marine microbiology, and laboratory techniques in molecular genetics.


Dr. Willey lives on the north shore of Long Island and has two grown sons. She is an avid runner and enjoys skiing, hiking, sailing, and reading. She can be reached at joanne.m.willey@ hofstra.edu.