Michelle Wang

Michelle Wang is the James Gilbert White Distinguished Professor of the Physical Sciences at Cornell University, affiliated with the College of Arts and Sciences and the Department of Physics. She is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. Her research focuses on the mechanics of DNA, motor proteins, and the interplay between DNA topology and biological processes like transcription and replication.

Education: B.S. in Nuclear Physics from Nanjing University (1985); Ph.D. in Biophysics from the University of Michigan (1983). Professional experience includes faculty roles at Cornell starting in 1998, progressing to full Professor (2009) and Distinguished Professor (2019).

Research interests include DNA topology, molecular motor coordination, and the development of advanced optical trapping technologies. Key innovations include angular optical traps and nanophotonics-based tools for single-molecule studies. Her lab explores how DNA mechanics influence processes like transcriptional pausing, replication fork stability, and chromatin dynamics.

Publications span over 30 years, with recent work emphasizing torsional mechanics, CRISPR dynamics, and DNA-protein interactions. Awards include the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship and recognition for pioneering contributions to biophysical instrumentation.

Labs/Teams: Wang Lab at Cornell, specializing in single-molecule biophysics and interdisciplinary approaches combining experimental and computational methods.