Amanda Lukens

Amanda Lukens, Ph.D.

Amanda Lukens

Amanda Lukens is a senior research scientist in the Infectious Disease and Microbiome Platform Malaria group at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, where she works under the guidance of Dyann Wirth. Since joining the Broad in 2011, she has been fully involved in malaria drug-discovery research, leading an effort in discovering the biological mechanisms of antimalarial compounds and understanding pathways to resistance to these molecules. This research stems from an interdisciplinary, highly-collaborative drug discovery program that has identified a broad range of probes of Plasmodium biology and continues to explore the molecular markers of drug tolerance and resistance and their implications for malaria surveillance and elimination efforts.

Lukens is an officer on the American Committee of Molecular, Cellular and Immunoparasitology executive council, a subgroup of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. She was invited to contribute to the Malaria Eradication Scientific Alliance malERA Refresh Agenda as a member of the “Basic science and enabling technologies” panel and as a lecturer for Harvard University’s Science of Eradication Leadership Development course.

Lukens completed her postdoctoral training in malaria drug discovery at the Broad institute under the mentorship of Roger Wiegand.  She holds a Ph.D. in microbiology and molecular genetics from Harvard University, where she completed her dissertation work on malaria population genetics and antigenic variation in Dyann Wirth's laboratory. Lukens earned a B.A. in biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania.

November 2022