WINSTON-SALEM (AP) — Wake Forest University has chosen Vanderbilt University provost and vice chancellor Susan Wente as its new president.

Wake Forest’s board of trustees recently approved Wente’s appointment following the unanimous recommendation of a search committee.

Wente will become Wake Forest’s president on July 1. She succeeds Nathan O. Hatch, who has served as the university’s president since 2005 and announced his retirement last fall.

Wente, a cell biologist, has served as Vanderbilt’s provost and vice chancellor for the past seven years. She served as interim chancellor from August 2019 to June 2020.

Wente holds a doctorate in biochemistry and began her teaching career at Washington University’s School of Medicine, where she was a faculty member from 1993 to 2002. At Vanderbilt, she served as a professor and chair of the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, and later as associate vice chancellor for research and senior associate dean for biomedical sciences.

She became Vanderbilt’s first female provost in 2014 and will be the first woman to serve as Wake Forest president.
Wente received a Bachelor of Science degree in biochemistry from the University of Iowa and her Ph.D in biochemistry from the University of California, Berkeley.