Professor Esther Duflo is the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics in the Department of Economics at MIT and a founder and director of the Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), a research network specializing in randomized evaluations of social programs. Her research focuses on microeconomic issues in developing countries, including household behavior, education, access to finance, health and policy evaluation.

Duflo has received numerous academic honors and prizes including the John Bates Clark Medal (2010), a MacArthur Fellowship (2009), the American Economic Association's Elaine Bennett Prize for Research (2003), the "Best French Young Economist Prize" (Le Monde/Cercle des economistes, 2005), the Médaille de Bronze (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 2005), and the Prix Luc Durand-Reville (Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques, 2008).