Molly Crockett, a professor of psychology and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University, and Sebastian Seung, the Anthony B. Evnin ’62 Professor in Neuroscience and Computer Science at Princeton, have been named recipients of major awards from the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). The awards will be presented on April 26 during the NAS’s 163rd annual meeting.
Crockett has received the Troland Research Award, which grants $75,000 to two early-career researchers each year to recognize exceptional achievement and support further empirical research in experimental psychology. The NAS cited Crockett “for their pioneering contributions to a mechanistic theory of moral cognition.” The official citation stated: “Through timely and elegant empirical studies, Crockett’s work has elucidated the role that learning and decision processes play in diverse moral behaviors and has shown how technologies such as social media can exploit these processes to erode trust in communities. Crockett’s work has significantly advanced our understanding of moral cognition, not only through original empirical discoveries, but through an expansive and interdisciplinary approach that is reshaping how psychologists think about morality in real-world contexts.”
Crockett commented on receiving the award: “I am especially honored to receive the Troland Research Award during a time when scientific research faces serious threats, resulting from the same political dynamics my lab has investigated over the past decade. This recognition will support my team’s future work exploring how systems of power shape the ways we understand the world, including the work we do as scientists.”
Before joining Princeton in 2022, Crockett held academic positions at Yale University and Oxford University. They earned degrees from UCLA (B.Sc.) and Cambridge (Ph.D.), followed by postdoctoral research with institutions in Zurich and London. Previous honors include awards from organizations such as the American Psychological Association and Association for Psychological Science.
The other recipient of this year’s Troland award is Jason Yeatman of Stanford University.
Sebastian Seung was selected for the Pradel Research Award, which recognizes a mid-career neuroscientist for significant contributions to understanding the nervous system. The award includes a $50,000 prize to support ongoing neuroscience research. According to NAS officials, Seung’s work “fundamentally reshaped modern neuroscience and computational biology, transforming our understanding of how neural circuits are reconstructed, analyzed, and interpreted.” The citation noted his impact on connectomics — mapping connections among neurons — stating his efforts transformed it “from a concept into a powerful field of discovery and redefined understanding of how brain structure gives rise to function.”
Seung said: “For over 20 years, many dedicated researchers around the world have worked to realize the dream of connectomics. I’m especially indebted to the talented members of my laboratory, past and present, and to Princeton University for its wonderful intellectual environment. It’s been my privilege to live a life in science.”
Since the early 2000s, Seung has applied machine learning techniques to map neuronal wiring diagrams using electron microscopy images. He contributed with colleagues in projects like MICrONS Consortium by reconstructing detailed wiring diagrams from mouse brain tissue samples. Additionally, he co-led with Mala Murthy at Princeton’s Neuroscience Institute on FlyWire Consortium efforts that produced a complete wiring diagram for all 140,000 brain cells in a fruit fly.
Seung previously worked at MIT and Bell Laboratories; he also served as president of Samsung Research. He holds bachelor’s and doctoral degrees from Harvard University.
