MacArthur Fellow Toby Kiers Studies Fungal Ecosystems

Toby Kiers '94, an evolutionary biologist, won a MacArthur Fellowship in 2025, receiving $800,000 with no restrictions for her research on fungal networks in ecosystems.

Kiers grew up in Cornwall, Connecticut, and spent her childhood exploring woodlands and foraging for morels. She attended Exeter, where she studied science using the Harkness system. "To learn science around a table rather than being lectured was a game changer," she said.

A semester at The Mountain School in Vermont in 1992 solidified her path. The 416-acre farm's outdoor classes and White Mountains backpacking trips convinced her to become a field biologist. She earned a degree in plant sciences from Bowdoin College.

Kiers, now a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, has conducted research in deserts and cloud forests across Africa and beyond. In 2011, she collected soil samples at Mount Kenya with her husband and two children. Her work tracks how fungi sustain ecosystems.