Jane Silverthorne

Dr. Silverthorne serves as Senior Scientific Advisory for the Supporters of Agricultural Research (SoAR) Foundation. Dr. Silverthorne received her B.Sc. degree in Biology (1st Class Hons.) from the University of Sussex, Brighton, England and the Ph.D. degree from the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Warwick under the supervision of Professor R. John Ellis. Her research training is in the area of plant biology and her research focused on the role of the phytochrome system in regulating plant growth and development.

Dr. Silverthorne conducted postdoctoral research in the laboratory of Professor Elaine Tobin at the University of California, Los Angeles and then served on the faculty at the University of California, Santa Cruz, as Assistant, Associate, and full Professor with tenure in the of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology from April 1987 until August 2004.

Dr. Silverthorne joined the National Science Foundation in 1999 as a rotating Program Director and subsequently accepted a permanent Program Director position in August 2003. During this time, she served as Cluster leader responsible for the management of the Plant Genome Program in the Division of Biological Infrastructure (DBI). Between November 2006 and March 2008, Dr. Silverthorne served on detail to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as a Senior Policy Analyst in the Life Sciences.

In November 2007, Dr. Silverthorne was appointed Acting Deputy Director for DBI, and she became Deputy Director in December 2008, joining the Senior Executive Service. In June 2009, she moved to the Division of Integrative Organismal Systems where she served as Deputy Division Director and Division Director. From April 2014 until her retirement in August 2017, Dr. Silverthorne served as Deputy Assistant Director for the Biological Sciences Directorate. In this role, she served as Vice President of the Board of Trustees for the Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) and as Head of the U.S. delegation to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).