Patricia Princehouse

Patricia Princehouse is an evolutionary biologist and historian of science at Case Western Reserve University, where she directs the Program in Evolutionary Biology and has served as associate director of the Institute for the Science of Origins. An Ohio native, she earned her bachelor's degree at Kent State, her master's at Yale and her PhD at Harvard, where she worked with Stephen Jay Gould and Richard Lewontin.

Her main interest is the evolution of apes and humans, and she does paleoanthropology fieldwork in Africa, including with the Turkana Basin Institute in Kenya. She has received numerous teaching awards. In 2001 she helped found Ohio Citizens for Science, and the National Center for Science Education honored her with its Friend of Darwin Award for safeguarding the integrity of science education in Ohio's public schools.

The Institute for the Science of Origins brings scientists together to understand how complex systems emerge and evolve, from the origins of the universe to microbes to the human mind, and it is known for its public lecture series and science tours.