Donald Kennedy (August 18, 1931 – April 21, 2020) was an American scientist, public administrator, and academic. He served as Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (1977–1979), President of Stanford University (1980–1992), and Editor-in-Chief of Science (2000–2008). Following this, he was named president emeritus of Stanford University; Bing Professor of Environmental Science and Policy, emeritus; and senior fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Early life and education Donald Kennedy was born on August 18, 1931 in New York City, the son of Barbara Bean and William Dorsey Kennedy. He attended Dublin School through high school and went on to attend Harvard University, where he received an A.B. degree in 1952, an M.S. degree in 1954, and a Ph.D. in 1956, all in Biology. His doctoral dissertation was titled Studies on the Frog Electroretinogram. Career Teacher From 1956 to 1960, Kennedy taught biology at Syracuse University, receiving tenure by 1960. His research included the patterns of neural action in crayfish, demonstrating some of the connection principles among nerve cells that impose the sequences underlying a behavioral event. Kennedy showed that some single neurons, which he termed "command" neurons, could produce a complex, fixed-action pattern of locomotory behavior. Arriving at Stanford University as an assistant professor in 1960, Kennedy was granted tenure in 1962. In 1967 he was appointed chairman of the Department of Biology in the School of Humanities and Sciences. He was one of the founding faculty in the Program in Human Biology, Kennedy served ten years on the board of directors of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. where he served as director from 1973 to 1977. FDA Commissioner For 26 months he served as Commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration during the Carter Administration, appointed by the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, Joseph Califano, in April 1977. In the next two-plus years Kennedy and the FDA dealt with issues such as the fallout from the attempt to ban saccharin, and the risks of antibiotic resistance in humans from agricultural antibiotic use and worked on provisions of the proposed Drug Regulation Reform Act of 1978. Stanford presidency After stepping down from the FDA in June 1979, Kennedy returned to Stanford, where he served as provost. In 1980 he became president of Stanford University and served in that position until 1992. While president, he inaugurated overseas campuses in Kyoto, Japan, and