Ruben L Gonzalez Jr
Ruben Gonzalez is a Professor of Chemistry at Columbia University. He is a first-generation Cuban-American and the first in his family to attend college. He obtained his B.S. in Chemistry and Biochemistry from Florida International University (FIU), a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI), in 1995 and his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley in 2000. Ruben next moved to Stanford University, where he conducted postdoctoral research as an American Cancer Society (ACS) Postdoctoral Fellow. At Stanford, Ruben worked on developing methods for visualizing biological processes at the highest level of molecular detail using advanced light microscopies. Using these methods, he began to study how ribosomes, the molecular machines that make all the proteins that keep all cells alive and healthy, execute their functions.
Ruben joined the Department of Chemistry at Columbia as an Assistant Professor in 2006 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2012 and Full Professor in 2015. Research in his laboratory involves the ongoing development and application of cutting-edge light microscopy methods for investigating the functions of molecular machines, with a continued emphasis on studying how ribosomes make proteins and the role of this process in human health and disease.
Ruben is the author of over 80 scientific publications and holds several US patents. He has chaired or served on the editorial boards of eLife journal and the Journal of Molecular Biology; grant review panels at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the ACS; and on the leadership or program committees of the Biophysical Society, the Protein Society, and the American Chemical Society. Ruben is a lecturer and Chair of Frontiers of Science, Columbia’s Core course in the physical and life sciences. He is also dedicated to promoting diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) in science and academia, including serving as a faculty advisor to Columbia’s Society for Chicanos/Latine and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) student group and as a member of Columbia’s Provost’s Advisory Council for the Enhancement of Faculty Diversity. His research, teaching, and mentorship accomplishments have been recognized with numerous awards, including a Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award in the Biomedical Sciences, an NSF CAREER Award, an ACS Research Scholar Award, a Lenfest Distinguished Columbia Faculty Award, and a Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award.