The IU faculty are among 471 scientists, engineers and innovators who have been elected for their scientifically and socially distinguished achievements throughout their careers. In total, 147 AAAS fellows are affiliated with IU. AAAS fellows are nominated by either the association’s steering groups or by three current fellows.
The 2024 IU fellows and their AAAS citations of merit are:
- Elliot Androphy, professor of dermatology, of microbiology and immunology, and of anatomy, cell biology and physiology at the IU School of Medicine, for distinguished contributions to the field of neuroscience for his studies of spinal muscular atrophy that led to the first approved treatment for spinal muscular atrophy, and advanced understanding of the pathogenesis of human papillomavirus infections.
- Karen Bush, professor of practice emerita of biology in the College of Arts and Sciences at IU Bloomington, for distinguished contributions to microbiology, particularly for developing novel antimicrobial agents against Gram-negative bacteria and discovery of bacterial resistance mechanisms to beta-lactam antibiotics.
- Amar Flood, professor of chemistry in the College of Arts and Sciences at IU Bloomington, for contributions to understanding the nature of anion recognition, carbon-hydrogen bonding and ionic self-assembly culminating in the design of shape-persistent macrocycles, novel supramolecular architectures and advanced fluorescent materials.
- Cindy Hmelo-Silver, Distinguished Professor and associate dean for research and development at the IU School of Education in Bloomington, for distinguished contributions to the learning sciences and science education, particularly for scholarship on advanced technology to support collaborative inquiry and problem-based learning in complex STEM domains.
- Mark Kaplan, chair of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the IU School of Medicine, for distinguished contributions in the field of immunology, cytokine biology and insights into allergic disease.
- Filippo Menczer, Luddy Distinguished Professor of Informatics and Computer Science at the IU Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering in Bloomington, for seminal contributions to web and data science, network science, computational social science, social media analytics, science of science, and modeling of complex information systems.
- Sidney L. Shaw, professor of biology in the College of Arts and Sciences at IU Bloomington, for distinguished contributions toward understanding the plant cytoskeleton, and for innovative approaches to undergraduate research training.
“Each of these fellows is pushing the boundaries of human knowledge,” IU President Pamela Whitten said. “Just as important, they’re creating new opportunities for IU students and developing game-changing innovations. They embody the critical role IU research plays in creating a better world.”
Elliot Androphy
Before coming to IU, Androphy held faculty positions at Tufts Medical School and the University of Massachusetts Medical School. He specializes in dermatology, mechanisms of HPV induced malignancies, and the development of novel antiviral drugs.
Androphy is the cofounder and chief scientific officer of Kovina Therapeutics Inc, a biotechnology company developing antiviral therapeutics to treat premalignant infections and cancers caused by HPV.
Karen Bush
Bush’s 35 years in the pharmaceutical industry were spent studying novel beta-lactamases, which are enzymes in pathogenic bacteria that cause resistance to penicillin and other beta-lactam antibiotics. Her scientific teams have identified or developed several marketed antibiotics, such as aztreonam (Azactam), piperacillin-tazobactam (Zosyn) and levofloxacin (Levaquin).
At IU, Bush taught in the biotechnology program for 15 years, establishing a laboratory to identify additional beta-lactamases and other mechanisms responsible for global outbreaks of resistant bacteria. Her lab characterized beta-lactam resistance mechanisms in central Indiana health care facilities, in collaboration with the IU School of Medicine Pathology Laboratory. Her lab also contracted research for pharmaceutical companies to characterize the antibacterial activity of new investigational drugs against these resistant bacteria.
Amar Flood
Flood is a chemist whose research spans organic, inorganic, materials and supramolecular chemistry. Using chemical synthesis, he created novel molecules that allow smaller ones to combine into functional multi-molecule architectures. This led to the discovery of small-molecule, ionic isolation lattices, which are known as the brightest fluorescent materials in the world. He is the co-founder of Halophore, a startup commercializing the fluorescent materials.
Cindy Hmelo-Silver
Hmelo-Silver studies how people learn about complex phenomena and how technology can assist learning. She studies problem-based learning and collaborative inquiry, collaborative knowledge construction, and computer-supported collaborative learning. Her work also focuses on the role of technology to support collaborative learning and problem-solving.
She is currently a co-principal investigator on the National Science Foundation’s ENGAGE AI Institute, where she works with interdisciplinary teams to create narrative-centered STEM learning environments. In her current projects, Hmelo-Silver investigates adaptive support for collaborative learning in game-based environments, conceptualizes collaborative engagement in inquiry learning, and explores how AI can support learning to facilitate collaborative inquiry.
Mark Kaplan
Kaplan is the Nicole Brown Professor of Immunology, a professor and chair of microbiology and immunology, a professor of pediatrics, and a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the IU School of Medicine, as well as the director of basic science at the Brown Center for Immunotherapy. His research focuses on how cytokines regulate inflammation in diseases including allergies, asthma, cancer and autoimmunity. Kaplan is also working on developing allergen-specific anaphylaxis inhibitors for use in patients.
In 2024, Kaplan finished a five-year term as the editor-in-chief of ImmunoHorizons, a scientific journal published by the American Association of Immunologists. He was named a Distinguished Fellow of the American Association of Immunologists in 2025.
Filippo Menczer
Menczer is a computational social scientist, with research spanning network science and data science, particularly focused on analyzing and modeling the spread of misinformation. His lab is working to develop tools to detect and counter social media manipulation.
He is a faculty affiliate of the Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research and the director of the Observatory on Social Media.
Sidney Shaw
Shaw directs IU’s Light Microscopy Imaging Center under IU Research and formerly directed the Integrated Freshman Learning Experience for the College of Arts and Sciences at IU Bloomington. He holds courtesy appointments with the College’s Department of Physics and Biochemistry Program, and he serves as faculty for annual microscopy courses at the Marine Biological Laboratories in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.
His work centers on eukaryotic cell biology and plant molecular biology. Shaw studies how the microtubule cytoskeleton organizes and influences cellular morphogenesis, focusing on the interphase microtubule arrays in Arabidopsis plants as a model for understanding how cells generate ordered patterns in acentriolar cells.
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