David Berkowitz

David B. Berkowitz is the assistant director for the U.S. National Science Foundation Mathematical and Physical Sciences Directorate, where he oversees the NSF Office of Strategic Initiatives and the NSF divisions of Astronomical Sciences, Chemistry, Materials Research, Mathematical Sciences and Physics and an annual budget of approximately $1.7 billion dedicated to funding fundamental science, major facilities and infrastructure, and training the next generation of scientists.

He serves as co-chair of the National Science and Technology Council Subcommittee on Quantum Information Science at the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) at the White House.  Berkowitz served as division director for the NSF Division of Chemistry from 2020-2024 and co-chaired the Sustainable Chemistry Strategy team at OSTP. He is also Elmer H. and Ruby M. Cordes Professor of Chemistry at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), where he leads an active research group engaged in science at the interface of chemistry and biology. His interests are in stereo-controlled synthesis, biocatalysis, developing and applying novel screening methodologies and the mechanistic study and inhibition of pyridoxal phosphate-dependent enzymes. Berkowitz is co-founder and co-lead of the Nebraska Drug Discovery and Development Pipeline, a research superstructure designed to foster collaborative research between UNL and the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Berkowitz has a bachelor's degree from the University of Chicago, a doctoral degree from Harvard University and he was a Merck Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University. He served as a visiting professor at the Université de Paris in 2016, the Max Planck Institute in Dortmund, Germany in 2006 and the Université de Rouen in Normandy, France in 2005. Berkowitz is a 2024 American Chemical Society Fellow. He is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.