About
In 1993, Cynthia’s pioneering discovery that changing a single gene could double the lifespan of healthy, fertile C. elegans roundworms sparked an intensive study of the molecular biology of aging. Her findings showed that, contrary to popular belief, aging does not “just happen” in a haphazard way. Instead, the rate of aging is under active control by the genes and can be changed. Animals (and likely people) contain genetic programs that affect aging by coordinating diverse collections of downstream genes that together protect and repair the cells and tissues. Her findings have led to the realization that a universal hormone-signaling pathway influences the rate of aging in many species, including mammals.
Cynthia earned her Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and then studied with Nobel laureate Sydney Brenner in Cambridge, England. In 1986, she joined the faculty of the University of California at San Francisco where she became the Herb Boyer Distinguished Professor and an American Cancer Society Professor, before joining Calico in 2014. Kenyon is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and she is a former president of the Genetics Society of America. She has received many scientific honors and awards.