Announcing the McNulty Chair for Science Innovation & Leadership at Hunter College

With the support of Hunter and the Foundation, CUNY has named Dr. Mandë Holford, a pioneering marine biochemist at Hunter and the CUNY Graduate Center, as the inaugural holder of the McNulty Chair.

The McNulty Chair recognizes a prominent scientist, who has distinguished themselves through their teaching, research, scholarship, entrepreneurial activities and partnerships as well as, awards and grants. Importantly, they have demonstrated a deep commitment to advancing women in STEM fields throughout their career. This is the first chair for a scholar at Hunter dedicated to outstanding leaders in science and, as a named professorship, is the highest honor the college can bestow upon a faculty member.

In 2023, Dr. Holford became the first CUNY faculty member to win the National Institutes of Health Common Fund Health Pioneer Award for her trailblazing research exploring the therapeutic opportunities and properties of venoms from cephalopods and other marine mollusks. She is also a longtime mentor of Hunter’s John P. McNulty Scholars, a prestigious program that identifies high-achieving undergraduate students in STEM majors and supports them in becoming leaders in their fields.

“We are honored to recognize Dr. Holford, an extraordinary scholar and innovator,” said Anne Welsh McNulty, President of the McNulty Foundation. “Her work has revolutionized our understanding of venom and the potential uses of its compounds, and her influence goes far beyond, as a visionary and advocate who has played a key role in accelerating women in STEM at Hunter and across other professional and academic institutions.”

Ms. McNulty and the Foundation created the McNulty Scholars Program at Hunter in 2010 in honor of her late husband, John P. McNulty, a son of immigrants from Ireland who, like many Scholars, was the first in his family to attend college. The program trains and supports undergraduate women to lead in STEM fields. Many have gone on to publish scientific papers, pursue MDs, PhDs, and MD-PhDs, and build careers in STEM. The McNulty Chair builds on this impact by providing a vision for Women in Science at Hunter (WiSH), an initiative to support Hunter College’s extraordinary women STEM faculty in their research and careers.

The McNulty Chair will collaborate and develop strong relationships with a broad constituency of stakeholders, within and outside of Hunter College, including the WiSH Program, McNulty Scholars Program, and Hunter’s STEM faculty. The chair will also inspire other public institutions nationwide by developing programs that foster excellence and inclusion in STEM.

“I am honored to be selected as the inaugural McNulty Chair,” Dr. Holford said. “It has been my mission to inspire Hunter students’ love of science and enable them to participate in cuttingedge research that advances new knowledge and spurs drug discoveries that will save lives and enhance human health.”

Hunter is the only college in the world to graduate two women winners of the Nobel Prize in Medicine, Gertrude Elion ’37 and Rosalyn Yalow ’41. The chair continues this legacy of outstanding achievement.

The endowment and naming of the chair come at an exciting and pivotal moment in the history of Hunter and CUNY. New York State Governor Kathy Hochul, New York City Mayor Eric Adams, and CUNY Chancellor Félix V. Matos-Rodríguez have embarked on a public-private partnership, the Science Park and Research Campus (SPARC) Kips Bay initiative. SPARC will transform Hunter College’s Brookdale Campus on East 25th Street and First Avenue into state-of-the-art teaching and commercial facilities with more than 1.5 million square feet of academic, public health, and life sciences space.

In tandem with this unprecedented project, Hunter College will receive substantial public support for the renovation of its science laboratories and classrooms in the North Building — which will provide state-of-the-art facilities to its budding scientists on the Hunter main campus, too.