Dr. Bwarenaba Kautu is a medical research scientist from the Republic of Kiribati. He is currently based at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts. He also holds a tenured professorship position at Greenville University, Illinois, where he teaches biomedical classes and supervises undergraduate neuroscience research. Kautu's research students have published research papers in peer-reviewed international journals, and received multiple awards and honors for their research. His current research (and interests) at Harvard focus on infectious disease diagnostics, artificial intelligence technology, pharmacology, and neurotransmission.
Dr. Kautu received his PhD training in cell/molecular neuroscience in the lab of Guy and Kim Caldwell at The University of Alabama. While at Alabama, he mentored and trained undergraduate students who went on to win the prestigious Goldwater scholarship, the Benjamin Cummings Biology prize, and were named to USA Today’s All-USA College Academic Team (top 40-60 students in the nation). Kautu's mentees were also interviewed and/or accepted into MD and PhD programs at MIT, Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, Oxford, and Cambridge among many others.
Dr. Kautu was born and raised on a remote coral reef island in the Republic of Kiribati where he also completed his primary and secondary educations. Dr. Kautu is the first I-Kiribati native (born and raised in Kiribati) to receive a PhD degree in the United States. He is also the first I-Kiribati to hold a university science professorship position in the United States. He held his professorship position only at the age of 30. Further, Dr. Kautu was the very first person from Kiribati to receive formal scientific and medical research training at Harvard University. In 2017, he became the first I-Kiribati to receive a prestigious visiting fellowship award from Cambridge University in the United Kingdom. As of 2018, Dr. Kautu is the first and only I-Kiribati to have held formal academic affiliations with 3 of the top 5 universities in the world: Cambridge, Harvard, and Massachusetts Institutes of Technology(via the Broad Institute).
Dr. Kautu has received numerous honors and awards, including being named the recipient of the 2016 Outstanding Young Alumnus Award of University of Wisconsin-River Falls, his undergraduate alma mater.
Kautu's Academic/Scientific Family Tree
Dr. Sydney Brenner (Scientific Great Grandfather). 2002 Nobel Prize Winner in Medicine and Physiology. Credited for discovery of messenger RNA/genetic code and worked with Dr. Francis Crick who proposed the double helix structure of DNA.
Dr. Martin Chalfie (Scientific Grandfather). 2008 Nobel Prize Winner in Chemistry.
Dr. Guy Caldwell (Scientific Father). Distinguished Research Professor.