President Joe Biden announced on January 15th his nomination of Dr. Eric Lander, biologist and former leader of the Human Genome Project, to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and serve as the Presidential Science Advisor. Biden also announced that he was designating the Presidential Science Advisor a cabinet level position for the first time in history, illustrating the importance the new administration will place on the guidance of science in policymaking. Also nominated as Deputy Director of OSTP was Dr. Alondra Nelson, who is the president of the Social Science Research Council and a distinguished scholar of science, technology, social inequality and race.