Andrew Hamilton is an astrophysicist known for his scientifically accurate general relativistic visualizations of black holes, which have appeared on a number of TV documentary programs, including Nova and National Geographic, in a show at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and on the web, including on YouTube.

Seth Shostak is an astronomer, lecturer and the author and editor of several books, including the 2009 Confessions of an Alien Hunter: A Scientist’s Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (National Geographic). For much of his career, he conducted radio astronomy research on galaxies.

Dominic Johnson received a D.Phil. in evolutionary biology from Oxford University and a Ph.D. in political science from Geneva University.

David Battisti is The Tamaki Chair of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Washington. His research is focused on understanding the natural variability in climate that stems from the interaction between the ocean, atmosphere, land and sea ice. He is also studying the impacts of natural climate variability and climate change on global food security.

A managing partner at the consulting firm, Haseltine Partners, Eric Haseltine is a neuroscientist who has applied new discoveries about the human brain in fields as diverse as aerospace technology, virtual reality, special effects, journalism, entertainment and, most recently, national security and intelligence.

Recognized mathematician and computer scientist Brian Snow’s early work spans from teaching mathematics and laying the groundwork for a computer science department at Ohio University in the 1960’s, to working as a cryptologic designer and architect at the National Security Agency (NSA) in the 1970s.

An active member of the research community in the fields of cryptanalysis (breaking ciphers), computer security, and privacy, Orr Dunkelman has published numerous papers analyzing the security of ciphers and cryptosystems. He is widely recognized for his work on the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES).

Manager and research staff member of the Cryptography Research Group at IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center, Tal Rabin’s research focuses on the general area of cryptography and, more specifically, on multiparty computations, threshold and proactive security.

Bora Zivkovic is the blog editor at Scientific American magazine. Born in Belgrade, Serbia (then Yugoslavia) he majored in biochemistry and molecular biology in high school, trained horses, and studied veterinary medicine at University of Belgrade. Upon arrival in the United States, Zivkovic did research on circadian rhythms in Japanese quail at North Carolina State University.

Larry Greenemeier is the associate editor of technology coverage for Scientific American Online. He previously covered information technology security for the trade magazine InformationWeek.

Gary Stix commissions, writes and edits features, news articles and Web blogs for Scientific American. His area of coverage is neuroscience. He also has frequently been the issue or section editor for special issues or reports on topics ranging from nanotechnology to obesity.

Fran Norris studies disaster and human resilience as a community-social psychologist and a research professor in Dartmouth Medical School’s Department of Psychiatry.

Laurie Garrett is currently the senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. Garrett is the only writer ever to have been awarded all three of the Big “Ps” of journalism: The Peabody, The Polk and The Pulitzer.

Richard Rhodes is the author or editor of twenty-four books including The Making of the Atomic Bomb, which won a Pulitzer Prize in Nonfiction, a National Book Award and a National Book Critics Circle Award; Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb, which was shortlisted for a Pulitzer Prize in History; Why They Kill; a personal memoir, A Hole in the World; a biography, John James Audubon; and four novels.

LeVar Burton has been capturing the admiring attention of both audiences and his industry peers for three decades and continues to enjoy longevity truly rare within the industry. His deftness in avoiding stereotype continues to be a hallmark of an incredibly diverse career.

Drew Gehling was an original cast member of the revival of the classic musical On A Clear Day You Can See Forever where he played the role of Warren to critical acclaim alongside the incomparable Harry Connick, Jr.

Sebastien Gouin is intellectual property and venture capital technical manager at Vestergaard Frandsen, working out of headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, but spends much of his time traveling to evaluate new innovative technologies being fostered in labs, startups, and university incubators across the world.

Carey Hidaka is an IBM Public Sector Business Solutions Professional in IBM Global Business Services, with experience as a consultant in the Smarter Water Management business development team and mobile/wireless services.

French-Israeli Moran Cerf is a neuroscientist at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the departments of neurosurgery at UCLA and NYU, studying memories and emotions using electrodes implanted deep inside the brains of patients undergoing neurosurgery.

Peter Staley has been a long-term AIDS and gay rights activist, first as a member of ACT UP New York, then as the founding director of TAG, the Treatment Action Group. He served on the board of the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR) for 13 years.

Richard Matthew is a professor in the schools of social ecology and social science at the University of California at Irvine, and founding director of the Center for Unconventional Security Affairs.

Steven E. Koonin was appointed as the founding director of NYU’s Center for Urban Science and Progress in April 2012. He previously served as the U.S. Department of Energy’s second Senate-confirmed under secretary for science from 2009–2011.

Michael Laiskonis was named creative director of New York City’s Institute of Culinary Education in 2012. Previously executive pastry chef at Le Bernardin for eight years, his pastry philosophy manifested itself in a style of desserts that balanced art and science, and contemporary ideas with classic.

Clay Shirky is a leading voice on the social and economic impact of Internet technologies. Considered one of the finest thinkers on the Internet revolution, Shirky provides an insightful and optimistic view of networks, social software, and technology’s effects on society.

Michael Q. Bullerdick is a freelance contributing editor for several print, web and book publishers. He also frequently consults with publishers during critical transitions: launches, turnarounds, major workflow overhauls and leadership changes.

Odest Chadwicke Jenkins is an associate professor of Computer Science at Brown University. He explores human-robot interaction and robot learning with the goal of creating autonomous systems that can collaborate with humans in real-world tasks.

Dimitar Sasselov studies stars and planets at Harvard University, where he is the Phillips Professor of Astronomy. His research explores modes of interaction between light and matter. Sasselov and his team discovered several planets orbiting other stars with novel techniques that he hopes to use to find other planets like Earth.

Koos Lodewijkx is the chief technical officer for IT risk in the office of the IBM CISO. His responsibilities include the multiyear technical strategy for Cybersecurity for the IBM Corporation, technical architecture, IT risk assessment, and various IT risk policies and standards.

Radu Sion is a professor at Stony Brook University (on leave), the director of the National Security Institute, and the CEO of Private Machines Inc. Sion’s research is in cyber security and large-scale computing. He has published 85-plus peer-reviewed works in top venues and has organized 65-plus conferences.

Scott Atran is currently Research Professor and Presidential Scholar at the Center on Terrorism at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and Visiting Professor of Psychology and Public Policy at the University of Michigan.

France A. Córdova is an astrophysicist and the 14th director of the National Science Foundation (NSF), the only government agency charged with advancing all fields of scientific discovery, technological innovation, and science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education.

Colonel Linell Letendre is the permanent professor and Head of the Department of Law at the United States Air Force Academy.

Fernando Diaz is a senior researcher at Microsoft Research and a founding member of the MSR-NYC lab. Prior to joining Microsoft, Fernando was a senior scientist at Yahoo Research.

Carl Safina’s work has been recognized with MacArthur, Pew, and Guggenheim Fellowships, and his writing has won Orion, Lannan, and National Academies literary awards and the John Burroughs, James Beard, and George Rabb medals.

Jamie Metzl is a leading futurist, geopolitical expert, science fiction novelist, and Senior Fellow of the Atlantic Council. He was recently appointed to the World Health Organization expert advisory committee on human genome editing.

Meredith Whittaker is co-founder of the AI Now Institute, a leading university institute dedicated to researching the social implications of artificial intelligence and related technologies in an interdisciplinary context.

Ariel Zych is an educator, scientist, writer, and producer dedicated to sparking a love of science and math in others. Currently education director at Science Friday, she’s produced and created hundreds of experiments, activities, lessons, events, and workshops for kids, parents, and teachers in video, radio, print, web, and social media.

Jeanna N. Matthews is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York and a 2017-18 Fellow at Data and Society. She is a co-chair of the Association for Computing Machinery Subcommittee of Algorithmic Transparency and Accountability and an ACM Distinguished Speaker.

Cyndy Desjardins is a Food Web Biologist at the International Institute for Sustainable Development Experimental Lakes Area. She has extensive field experience in limnology research, having managed and trained both laboratory teams and fieldwork teams in a large-scale, multi-year aquatic ecology project.

William B. Hurlbut is a physician and adjunct professor in the Department of Neurobiology at Stanford University Medical Center. His primary areas of interest involve the ethical issues associated with advancing biomedical technology, the biological basis of moral awareness, and studies in the integration of theology and philosophy of biology.

Anil Seth is Professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience and Director of the Centre for Consciousness Science at the University of Sussex. He is also Co-Director of the Canadian Institute …

Thomas R. Horton is professor of Mycology at the State University of New York, College of Environmental Science and Forestry. His research is focused on mycorrhizal fungi.

Lily Xu is a PhD student studying computer science at the University of Southern California. She is part of the USC Center for AI in Society (CAIS), which aims to leverage artificial intelligence to address issues in conservation, public health, and public security.

Jeannette M. Wing is Avanessians Director of the Data Science Institute and professor of computer science at Columbia University. Her current interests are in the foundations of security and privacy, with a new focus on trustworthy AI.

Georgia Frances King is an editor and facilitator born in Melbourne Australia and based in New York. Currently the Ideas Editor at Quartz and formerly the Editor of Kinfolk magazine, she has fused her background in lifestyle journalism with her passion for emerging technology.

Eric Schmidt is an accomplished technologist, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. He joined Google in 2001 and helped grow the company from a Silicon Valley startup to a global leader in technology …