Joshua Weiner, Associate Dean for Research and Infrastructure and Professor of Biology, earned his PhD from the University of California, San Diego, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. He is an Associate Director of the Iowa Neuroscience Institute, and his research is focused on the molecular mechanisms of neuronal differentiation and neural circuit formation. His work has been funded by multiple grants from the National Institutes of Health, the March of Dimes, the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust, and other foundation awards. He has authored over 70 publications, which have been cited over 9,000 times.

In addition to his successful research program, Weiner has been an innovative teacher and mentor. The former Associate Chair for Graduate Education in Biology, he has mentored 11 PhD students and 25 undergraduate researchers, and received the Graduate College's Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award in 2018. He developed a popular general education course called "How the Brain Works (And Why it Doesn't)," and received the Collegiate Teaching Award from CLAS in 2017. He co-founded the interdisciplinary undergraduate neuroscience major, which has seen rapid growth in enrollment.

Weiner is interested in the interactions between science and the arts and humanities, and plans and executes outreach events for the Iowa Neuroscience Institute exploring those connections.