Daniel F. Jarosz

Principal Investigator

Senior Associate Dean for Basic Science, Stanford Medicine
Professor of Chemical and Systems Biology and of Developmental Biology

Biography

Daniel Jarosz is Senior Associate Dean for Basic Science at Stanford Medicine and Professor of Chemical and Systems Biology and of Developmental Biology. His laboratory investigates how cells and organisms balance robustness with the capacity for plasticity and rapid adaptation. The lab has established protein self-assembly and molecular chaperones as major regulators of heritable variation, showing how these mechanisms reshape mutation, gene regulation, drug resistance, aging, and evolutionary change.

The Jarosz Lab combines genetics, biochemistry, cell biology, genomics, proteomics, and experimental evolution to uncover mechanisms that change the relationship between genotype and phenotype. Current work spans protein-based inheritance, environmentally responsive genetic variation, proteome organization, and the emergence of adaptive traits.

Jarosz earned a BS in chemistry from the University of Washington and a PhD in biochemistry from MIT, where his doctoral work investigated specialized DNA polymerases and genome maintenance. He completed postdoctoral training with Susan Lindquist at the Whitehead Institute as a Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation fellow and joined the Stanford faculty in 2013.

In 2025, Jarosz became Stanford Medicine’s inaugural Senior Associate Dean for Basic Science. In this role, he works across the school to support basic-science faculty development and sponsorship, strengthen interdisciplinary connections, and advance a culture of ambitious fundamental discovery.