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Five faculty at the University of Pennsylvania have been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, an honorary society and independent research center founded in 1780. They are Dennis E. Discher of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, Michael Jones-Correa of the School of Arts & Sciences, Cherie Kagan of the School of Arts & Sciences and Penn Engineering, Sophia Rosenfeld of the School of Arts & Sciences, and Susan R. Weiss of the Perelman School of Medicine. They are joining the nearly 250 new members honored in 2025, recognized for their excellence, innovation, leadership, and broad array of accomplishments.
Dennis E. Discher is the Robert D. Bent Professor at Penn Engineering. He is director of the Physical Sciences Oncology Center at Penn, supported by the National Cancer Institute, and holds a secondary appointment in the Graduate Groups in Pharmacology at the Perelman School of Medicine. A member of both the U.S. National Academy of Medicine and the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, Discher has been part of the Penn community since 1996. His research lab has published over 250 papers, covering topics such as how physical forces affect stem cells and tumors, how the immune system recognizes the body’s own cells, and how specially designed nanoparticles can help treat disease.
Michael Jones-Correa is the President’s Distinguished Professor of Political Science in the School of Arts & Sciences. His research focuses on immigrant political incorporation, Latino politics, and coalition-building in urban settings. He is the author or co-author of several books, including “Holding Fast: Resilience and Civic Engagement among Latino Immigrants” and “Between Two Nations: The Political Predicament of Latinos in New York City,” and has published widely in leading political science journals. Jones-Correa has led major research projects such as the Philadelphia-Atlanta Project and the 2006 Latino National Survey. He serves on the Board of Trustees of the Russell Sage Foundation and was elected in 2025 as a Robert A. Dahl Fellow of the National Academy of Political and Social Science.
Cherie Kagan is the Stephen J. Angello Professor in the Department of Electrical and Systems Engineering with secondary appointments in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Penn Engineering and the Department of Chemistry in the School of Arts & Sciences. She is widely recognized for her pioneering research on nanostructured materials and their use in advanced devices for electronics, photonics, and sensing. Kagan directs the National Science Foundation-supported Engineering Research Center for the Internet of Things for Precision Agriculture. Since joining Penn in 2007, her lab has explored how to design and integrate materials with unique optical, electrical, and mechanical properties into functional technologies. She is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors and several major scientific societies and has received numerous honors, including the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award and the Heilmeier Award.
Sophia Rosenfeld is the Walter H. Annenberg Professor and Chair of the Department of History in the School of Arts & Sciences. She specializes in European and American intellectual and cultural history, with a focus on the Enlightenment, the Age of Revolutions, and the roots of modern democracy. Her latest book, “The Age of Choice: A History of Freedom in Modern Life,” was published in February 2025 recently and named a New York Times Editors’ Choice. She is also the author of “Common Sense: A Political History,” winner of the Mark Lynton History Prize, and co-editor of the award-winning, multi-volume “A Cultural History of Ideas," among other books. Her articles and essays have appeared in both academic and non-scholarly outlets, including The New York Times and The Washington Post.
Susan R. Weiss is a professor and vice chair of the Department of Microbiology and director of the Penn Center for Research on Coronaviruses and Other Emerging Pathogens at the Perelman School of Medicine. Over the last four decades, she has worked on many aspects of coronavirus replication and pathogenesis, making contributions to understanding its basic biology, as well as organ tropism and virulence. Her recent research has focused on human and murine coronavirus interaction with the host innate immune response and viral innate antagonists of double-stranded RNA-induced antiviral pathways. Weiss’ other research interests include the activation and antagonism of the PKR and OAS/RNase L antiviral pathways and pathogenic effects of host endogenous double-stranded RNA. Weiss is a fellow and currently a Governor of the American Academy of Microbiology and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and, in 2023, she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.