Dr. Schaechter is a Distinguished Professor, Emeritus at Tufts University, where he served as chairman of the Department of Molecular Biology and Microbiology from 1970 to 1993. He has worked on bacterial growth physiology and the relationship of the chromosome and the bacterial cell membrane. He has authored ten treatises and textbooks, most in collaboration with others, plus a book for the general public, In the Company of Mushrooms. He has served as President of the American Society for Microbiology. Currently, he is Adjunct Professor Emeritus, Biology Department, at San Diego State University and Visiting Scholar at the University of California, San Diego.