The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has presented its 2026 Lifetime Mentor Award to Mary Jo Ondrechen, professor of chemistry and chemical biology at Northeastern University in Boston. The award honors Dr. Ondrechen for her dedication to helping students from backgrounds underrepresented in STEM.
Dr. Ondrechen joined the Northeastern University faculty in 1980. Throughout her four-decades-long tenure, she has mentored numerous students and junior faculty, including scholars outside her field of study.
A member of the Mohawk Nation, Dr. Ondrechen has also been an active leader with the American Indian Science and Engineering Society. She developed the organization’s Lighting the Pathway to Faculty Careers for Natives in STEM, which has supported some 200 Native undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral scholars on their journeys to become faculty members at colleges, universities, and tribal colleges.
In her own scholarly work, Dr. Ondrechen focuses on understanding enzyme catalysis, inventing methods to predict the biochemical function of proteins from their 3D structure, developing design principles for novel enzymes, improving enzymatic RNA synthesis, and the molecular modeling aspects of structure-based drug discovery.
Dr. Ondrechen earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Reed College in Portland, Oregon, and a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.