Gene E. Robinson, executive director and CEO of the Discovery Partners Institute and the Maybelle Leland Swanlund Endowed Chair in Entomology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, has received the 2026 Campus Award for Excellence in Faculty Leadership. The award recognizes Robinson’s extraordinary leadership in advancing interdisciplinary collaboration, shaping major institutional initiatives and strengthening the University of Illinois’ research and innovation mission.
Presented by the Office of the Provost, the Campus Awards for Excellence in Faculty Leadership honor faculty members whose leadership elevates their units and the broader campus community. Recipients are recognized for building partnerships, guiding transformative initiatives and creating lasting institutional impact.
Since joining the Illinois faculty in 1989, Robinson has built an internationally renowned research program focused on the genetic and neural mechanisms of social behavior. Using the western honeybee (Apis mellifera) as a model system, his work integrates genomics, neuroscience and behavior to understand how genes and brain processes shape complex social systems. His research helped pioneer the interdisciplinary field of sociogenomics and contributed to the international effort to sequence the honeybee genome.
Beyond his scientific achievements, Robinson has been a driving force in advancing interdisciplinary science at Illinois. For nearly 15 years, he served as director of the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, helping transform the institute into a globally recognized hub for collaborative research tackling some of the most pressing scientific and societal challenges.
Robinson now serves as executive director and CEO of the Discovery Partners Institute, University of Illinois’ Chicago-based AI innovation hub designed to connect research, education and entrepreneurship. In this role, he is guiding DPI’s next chapter as it advances work in artificial intelligence, quantum technologies and the future of advanced computing while strengthening partnerships between the University of Illinois and Chicago’s industry and innovation ecosystem.
Through DPI, Robinson is expanding opportunities for Illinois faculty and students to engage with industry, accelerate applied discovery and contribute to the state’s growing technology economy.
Robinson is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The Campus Award for Excellence in Faculty Leadership recognizes his longstanding commitment to advancing interdisciplinary discovery, building collaborative institutions and strengthening the impact of the University of Illinois.