Pamela Bjorkman is the David Baltimore Professor of Biology and Biological Engineering and a Merkin Institute Professor at Caltech.

She received a BA in Chemistry from the University of Oregon and a PhD in Biochemistry from Harvard University. As a graduate student and postdoctoral fellow with Don Wiley, she solved the first 3-D structure of a major histocompatibility complex molecule.

Bjorkman is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and an elected Fellow of AAAS. She received the William B. Coley Award for Distinguished Research in Immunology, the James R. Klinenberg Science Award, the Gairdner Foundation International Award, the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Award, the Max Planck Research Award, the Rose Payne Distinguished Scientist Award, an NIH Director’s Pioneer Award, the Ceppellini Award from European Federation for Immunogenetics, was a L’OREAL-UNESCO Women in Science Laureate, and received the Pearl Meister Greengard prize.

Bjorkman’s lab studies the structural basis of the host immune response to HIV-1, SARS-CoV-2, and other viruses.