Caroline S. Harwood is an American microbiologist who was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2009.
Harwood studied at Colby College in Maine, and then received a master's degree in biology from Boston University.
She studied under Ercole Canale-Parola at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she received her PhD in microbiology.
[4] Her research topics include metabolic networks, bacterial signaling, and bioenergy production.
She was the head of the project that uncovered the sequence of the genome of Rhodopseudomonas palustris, a bacterium that performs photosynthesis and is capable of heterotrophy and hydrogen production.