Professor & Chair of Biology and Co-PI Arkansas LSAMP, University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff
Anissa Evans Buckner, Ph.D. received her Ph.D. in 2000 from Purdue University in West Lafayette, IN where her dissertation research focused on HIV-1 gene regulation in T cells. She received her bachelor’s of science degree in biology with a minor in chemistry from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff (UAPB).
After graduate school, Dr. Buckner completed a one-year postdoctoral fellowship in T-lymphocyte signaling and immunology at Purdue before joining the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, AR in 2001. She conducted a second postdoctoral fellowship in ocular virology focusing on cytomegalovirus regulation in the retinal pigment epithelium and later herpes stromal keratitis. Dr. Buckner quickly moved up the academic ranks at the medical center and also served as the Acting Director for the Walker Eye Research Center from 2005-2006. In January 2009, Dr. Buckner joined the faculty at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff as an Associate Professor of Biology and Project Director for the Arkansas Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (ARK-LSAMP). In February 2010, she became the chair of the Department of Biology where she works with the largest science discipline in the School of Arts and Sciences. In July 2018, Dr. Buckner was promoted to the rank of full professor. Currently, she serves as a grant reviewer with the National Science Foundation (NSF) and other federal agencies. She also serves as the co-Principal Investigator for ARK-LSAMP, ARK-LSAMP BD, HBCU-UP and the U.S. Department of Education-funded Graduate-STEM program which includes the state of Arkansas’ first master’s degree in computer science education in the Delta at UAPB. Professionally, she is a member of the American Society for Microbiology and Arkansas Academy of Sciences.