Martin W. Hetzer is a NOMIS board member and the president and CEO of the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA).

Hetzer received his PhD in biochemistry and genetics from the University of Vienna (Austria), and completed postdoctoral work at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL; Heidelberg, Germany). He joined the faculty at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies (La Jolla, US) in 2004 and became a full professor in 2011. He has received numerous awards, including a Pew Scholar Award, an Early Life Scientist Award from the American Society of Cell Biology, a Senior Scholar Award for Aging from the Ellison Medical Foundation, a Senior Scholar Award from the American Cancer Society, a Royal Society Research Merit Award and the Glenn Award for Research in Biological Mechanisms of Aging. Hetzer was the Jesse and Caryl Philips Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology and the director of the Waitt Advanced Biophotonics Center at the Salk Institute until 2023, when he was appointed president and CEO of ISTA.

His research focuses on fundamental aspects of organismal aging with special emphasis on the heart and central nervous system. His laboratory has also made important contributions to the field of cancer research and cell differentiation.