Joseph R. Ecker

Joseph R. Ecker is an American plant biologist and molecular biologist.He isProfessor of Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology Laboratory and Director of the Genomic Analysis Laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. He is also an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He holds the Salk International Council Chair in Genetics.

He is also an Adjunct Professor in the Section of Cell and Developmental Biology, UC San Diego.

Ecker finished his BA in biology in 1978 from The College of New Jersey. He then joined the laboratory of virologist Dr. Richard Hyman and studied herpes viruses at the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine. He joined Ronald W. Davis's lab at Stanford University. In 1987 he was appointed as an assistant professor at the Plant Science Institute at the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, PA).

• 2011 Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
• 2011 George W. Beadle Award, Genetics Society of America
• 2009 #2 Scientific Discovery of the Year 2009-TIME Magazine