Rate My Professor Karl Deisseroth

Karl Deisseroth is the D.H. Chen Professor of Bioengineering and of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He received his A.B. in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard University in 1992, his Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Stanford University in 1998, and his M.D. from Stanford University in 2000. He completed postdoctoral training, a medical internship, and an adult psychiatry residency at Stanford University and is board-certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. Deisseroth continues to practice as a psychiatrist at Stanford, specializing in affective disorders and autism-spectrum disease. His laboratory pioneered optogenetics and hydrogel-tissue chemistry methods including CLARITY, and he has applied these technologies to identify neural cell types and connections underlying adaptive and maladaptive behaviors. He has served as chair of undergraduate education in bioengineering at the Stanford University School of Engineering and has been a professor at Stanford since 2005, advancing to full professor in 2012. Deisseroth has received numerous honors including the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award, the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award in 2021, the Japan Prize in Life Sciences in 2023, the Luisa Gross Horwitz Prize in 2022, and the Asan Award in Basic Medicine in 2025. He is the author of key publications on optogenetics and related methods that have been widely adopted in neuroscience research worldwide.

Deisseroth’s work has had substantial influence on the fields of neuroscience, bioengineering, and psychiatry through the development and dissemination of enabling technologies used by thousands of laboratories. He maintains an active clinical practice while leading research efforts that combine neural stimulation techniques with pharmacological approaches for mood disorders. Additional appointments include roles supporting national initiatives in brain research. His contributions continue to shape understanding of brain function and behavior through rigorous experimental approaches grounded in his dual expertise in engineering and medicine.