David Lee, Ph.D.
David Lee served as vice president for research at the University of Georgia from 2005 to 2021. Under his leadership, UGA grew its research enterprise to a half-billion dollars a year in grants and contracts and added world-class facilities and technology. He also led the recruitment of nine GRA Eminent Scholars to UGA and served as executive VP of the UGA Research Foundation.
Lee joined UGA after a 20-year career at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. For most of that time, he served as scientific program leader for cell biology in the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, and in 1998 was also named head of UNC’s Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics.
From 1983 to 1985, Lee worked in industry as a senior scientist at Oncogen, which was acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb. He began his research career as a postdoc fellow in biochemistry at Washington University, and later as a postdoc fellow in pharmacology at the University of Washington.
Lee has served on the boards of several national organizations, including the Southeastern University Research Association, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Center for BioEnergy Innovation, and Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU). He was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement.
He earned his B.S. in biology from Stanford University and his Ph.D in biochemistry from the University of Washington.
