Global impact to address the world's challenges

Jelle Vehof received his medical and doctoral degrees at the University Medical Center Groningen in the Netherlands. He is an ophthalmologist and epidemiologist, working with large population-based cohorts (TwinsUK at King’s College London and Lifelines in Groningen), and clinical dry eye cohorts (GLOSSY cohort in Groningen, DROPS study cohort in London). Dr. Vehof’s research focuses on the epidemiology and genetics of dry eye disease, the link between chronic pain and dry eye, and personalized treatment and determinants of treatment efficacy in dry eye. He was a member of the TFOS DEWS II epidemiology subcommittee.  Dr. Vehof is currently an NIHR Clinical Lecturer in ophthalmology at King’s College London, UK.

Dr Aditya Rawal was awarded a PhD in 2007 from the Department of Chemistry, The Iowa State University. He is currently a Senior Lecturer at UNSW, and carries out research at the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Facility within the Mark Wainwright Analytical Centre.  His work focuses on the characterization of order and disorder in multicomponent systems such as spider silks, pharmaceutical formulations, metal organic frameworks and lithium-ion batteries. This characterization leads to a deeper understanding of the origin of material properties in these systems. His tool of choice for these investigations is solid state NMR spectroscopy, which enables him to connect common features of molecular dynamics and site-specific chemical interactions among this diverse range of fields. He is deeply involved in developing instrumental and technical capabilities to broaden the impact of NMR spectroscopy to characterize a range of functional materials.  

Sean Blamires attained a PhD in Biology from the University of Sydney in 2007. He also has a Graduate Diploma of Education (University of New South Wales, 2003). He has held research positions at Tunghai University, Taiwan (2009-2014), University of Akron, USA (2011), and the University of New South Wales (2014-2018), along with teaching positions at New York University (2014-2020) and Notre Dame University (2020). Dr Blamires’ research interests range from the physiological ecology of spider silk and webs to the genetic engineering of silk products. He is the founder of the Spider Silk Research Lab, which has collaborations across 5 continents and engages in cross-disciplinary research on silks and other materials. Dr Blamires has authored over 70 Scientific papers with over 100 collaborators, including publications in  prominent journals such Annual Review in Entomology, Current Biology, and Chemical Communications. His papers have been cited over 1200 times.

Dr Deady is postdoctoral research fellow working within the Workplace Mental Health Research Program. He has over twelve years research experience in the field of mental health and substance use disorders. In this time he has worked on a range of projects at a coronial, epidemiological, and clinical level, completing his PhD at UNSW in 2015. Dr Deady has extensive expertise in e-health project management, online service delivery and clinical trials.

His primary research interest is in improving access to evidence-based care through technology and the translation of research into practice, particularly in vulnerable populations including young people and high-risk workforces. Dr Deady has been involved in the development and evaluation of multiple mental health smartphone apps and e-health technologies. He is currently funded through an iCare Foundation postdoctoral fellowship.

Professor of Defence Mental Health

Professor Neil Greenberg is a consultant occupational and forensic psychiatrist. Neil served in the United Kingdom Armed Forces for more than 23 years and has deployed, as a psychiatrist and researcher, to a number of hostile environments including Afghanistan and Iraq. Neil is an advisor to the Academic Department of Military Mental Health and also runs March on Stress (www.marchonstress.com) which is a psychological health consultancy.

Neil has published more than 200 scientific papers, book chapters and has presented to national and international audiences on matters concerning the psychological health of the UK Armed Forces, organisational management of traumatic stress and occupational mental health. He has been the Secretary of the European Society for Traumatic Stress Studies and the President of the UK Psychological Trauma Society. He is the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ Lead for Military and Veterans Health. He is also a trustee with Walking for the Wounded and an independent director of the Forces in Mind Trust.

Dr Andrew Dansie is a Senior Lecturer in Humanitarian Engineering. He has 13 years of experience in the water and development sector spanning the private sector, multilateral organisations, universities and an NGO. His time as a Research Fellow with the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health saw him work with projects and partners across six continents. As Project Director of a four-year global assessment of transboundary water projects, he coordinated over 100 scientists and stakeholders to better understand the scientific needs for managing the world’s rivers, lakes, aquifers, coastal and ocean environments. Dansie completed his PhD at the University of Oxford. His research was on the marine fertilisation affect of dust originating from ephemeral rivers in Southern Africa. Dansie completed his Masters at the University of Adelaide, where was the Medal recipient for outstanding research, and holds a BSc from Flinders University in South Australia. He is an Honorary Research Associate at the University of Oxford and is on the UNDP vetted expert roster for international freshwater resources management.

Tess M.S. Neal is an assistant professor of psychology at ASU, where she directs the Future of Forensic Science Initiative (https://forensics.asu.edu) and the Clinical and Legal Judgment Laboratory (https://psych-law.lab.asu.edu/). She is fascinated by the nature and limits of expertise, and her research focuses on understanding and improving human judgment processes.

Her work comprises three overlapping categories: (1) expert judgment, such as identifying systematic bias in how forensic psychologists and forensic scientists reach conclusions, problems in how judges make decisions about evidence admissibility, and understanding how policymakers rely on evidence to create policy; (2) lay judgments, such as jurors’ calibration to the strength of evidence, how people perceive experts, and how people respond to policies and laws; and (3) public policy implications of this work, such as how expert judgment processes can be structured to reduce systematic bias and error, how to improve judicial and jury decision making, and how policymakers can harness psychological science about how people behave to craft effective policy.

Her research is funded by multiple grants from the National Science Foundation, and she has published one edited book and more than three dozen peer-reviewed publications in such journals as Psychological Science in the Public Interest; American Psychologist; PLOS ONE; Psychology, Public Policy, and Law; and Criminal Justice and Behavior.  She is currently serving as associate editor of the Journal of Personality Assessment and Psychology, Public Policy, and Law. She has won multiple university and national awards for her research, teaching, and mentorship.

Richard C. Knopf serves as director of the Partnership for Community Development at Arizona State University and of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Arizona State University. He is also a professor of community development in the School of Community Resources and Development within the Watts College of Public Service and Community Solutions at ASU.   His expertise rests in advancing community quality of life by building innovative inter-generational partnerships among businesses, government, non-profit and community service organizations. Over the past decade, he has managed investments of more than $2.5 million by corporations, government, and local and national foundations in his ASU centers to promulgate this mission.

Professor Knopf has authored more than 170 publications in community quality of life, including state-of-art reviews. In recognition of the global and local impact of his work, he was bestowed with the Community Development Achievement Award from the Community Development Society in 2014. He has also formed partnerships with the work of the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning and its global “Learning Communities” initiative, and serves on the steering committee for the Global Age Friendly University Network.   

Much of Knopf’s teaching and research has focused on the role of community development in life quality enhancement and economic growth. His specialty areas include: healthy aging and lifespan development, inter-generational programming, community building, community development theory and practice, community needs and assets assessment, community justice and marginalization, civic engagement and volunteerism, strategic planning and visioning, community well-being, community special events management, regional planning, program evaluation and assessment, non-profit capacity building, organizational marketing and promotions, natural resources policy, university-community partnership formation, grant writing, and public philanthropy.

Associate Professor Josh Keller's primary research interest is studying how managers respond to strategic paradoxes, including how to cooperate and compete, how to learn new endeavours and take advantage of knowledge of existing endeavours, and how to be both global and local. He also examines cross-cultural differences in approaches to paradoxes. His work has been published in multiple top-tier managerial journals, including Academy of Management Journal, Organization Science, Organization Studies, Human Relations and Organizational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes.

As the Program Director for the Master of International Business program, Associate Professor Josh Keller oversees curriculum and engagement issues for the program. He is also actively involved in ensuring that international topics are integrated into School of Management student learning at undergraduate and post-graduate levels.

Michael Etter has a PhD in organization studies and cultural theories from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland. He has worked as assistant professor at Copenhagen Business School and as Marie-Curie Research Fellow at Cass Business School, City, University of London. His work has appeared in academic journals, such as Academy of Management Annals, Academy Management Review, Journal of Management Studies, and Business and Society. Michael Etter has received multiple awards for his research and teaching excellence, as well as several research grants from prestigious funding institutions, such as the British Academy.

Michael Etter is interested in the construction of social evaluation of new and established firms, such as organizational reputation and legitimacy, in the new media landscape, which is shaped by new information and communication technologies (ICT). He looks at strategies, which new and established firms use to establish favourable social judgments in the digital economy. The role corporate social responsibility is thereby prevalent in his work.

Rhett Larson is the Richard Morrison Professor of Water Law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law. He is also a faculty fellow in the Center for Law and Global Affairs, and the Center for Law, Science, and Innovation. He is also a senior research fellow with the Kyl Center for Water Policy at ASU's Morrison Institute for Public Policy. Professor Larson’s research and teaching interests are in property law, administrative law, and environmental and natural resource law, in particular, domestic and international water law and policy.

Professor Larson’s research focuses on the impact of technological innovation on water rights regimes, in particularly transboundary waters, and on the sustainability implications of a human right to water. He works on dispute resolution and improved processes in water rights adjudications in Arizona and the Colorado River Basin with the Kyl Center for Water Policy. He is the Principal Investigator on a USAID-funded applied research project improving water supplies for refugee host communities in Lebanon and Jordan. Professor Larson was a visiting professor and Fulbright Scholar at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador, a visiting fellow with the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, a Lady Davis Fellow and visiting professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of the forthcoming book from Oxford University Press, entitled Just Add Water: Solving the World’s Problems Using its Most Precious Resource.

Professor Larson also practiced environmental and natural resource law with law firms in Arizona, focusing on water rights, water quality, and real estate transactions.

Lara Ferry is the Associate Dean of Research and Strategic Initiatives for the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences and a President's Professor. She holds an academic appointment in the School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences. She is also a senior sustainability scientist with the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability, affiliated faculty with the Biodesign Institute and the Global Security Initiative, and honors faculty in Barrett Honors College at Arizona State University.

Prior to joining ASU in 2010, she was a member of the research faculty at San Jose State University and Moss Landing Marine Laboratories. Her research focuses on the evolution of jaws and their function in the aquatic realm, as well as the performance of biological materials.

Dr. Felicia M. Mitchell joined the School of Social Work at Arizona State University in August 2016. Mitchell is committed to social justice for all oppressed and marginalized peoples and advocates for the advancement of environmental and health equity in communities of color. Her primary research interests focus on social determinants of health (inclusive of environmental determinants) and their impact on Indigenous health and well-being. Mitchell's work seeks to promote public and policy responsiveness to the health, social and anthropological dimensions of environmental change specifically related to water. Mitchell values community-based participatory research principles when partnering with communities and organizations around group-identified health and ecological concerns. Mitchell's secondary line of scholarship focuses on advancing social work education through critical reflection and engagement that seeks to dismantle settler-colonial standards in academia. Using a critical lens, she examines teaching and curriculum standards to increase accurate representations of historically underrepresented populations in the classroom and advocates for the eradication of oppressive higher education and research practices.

Dr Kirk Plangger is a Senior Lecturer of Marketing at King's Business School. He is a marketing management researcher specialising in consumer led digital marketing strategy.

Kirk studied consumer behaviour and marketing strategy during his PhD-level and general management during his MBA at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. He has an honours BA in economics from Western University in London, Canada and has four years management experience in Tokyo, Japan.

Most of his research in exploring how digital technologies mediate and change the buying process and how organisations should address these technologies. Dr Plangger uses this knowledge of buying and technology in all the modules he teaches including marketing strategy, digital marketing and consumer behaviour and challenges his students to constantly apply academic concept to practical challenges. He is also the Director of the Executive MSc in International Marketing programme. 

Dr Annapurna Vyakarnam runs a laboratory that probes host pathogen interactions and adaptive immunity pertinent to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and HIV-tuberculosis (TB) coinfection, a recognized global health problem by the World Health Organisation.  With international funding support, she is currently seconded as a King’s College London staff scientist to the Indian Institute of Science, where she has set up an advanced wet laboratory facility to study HIV-TB coinfection in India, a TB endemic region of the world.   At the laboratory in depth functional analysis is conducted of immune cells isolated from HIV/TB-infected subjects, with an aim to deconvolute the adaptive T-cell response and identify novel correlates of protective immunity to both improve understanding of disease process and promote vaccine design and disease monitoring for the treatment of TB and HIV-TB coinfection.  

Dr Vyakarnam is the International Lead for School of Immunology & Microbial Sciences at King’s College London.

Dr Katie Meehan is Senior Lecturer in Human Geography at King's College London and director of the Plumbing Poverty Project. With a focus on social justice and infrastructure provision in cities, her research explores urban water insecurity and how households innovate new water supply technologies and governance practices in the context of social and racial inequality. By coupling innovative methods in ethnography and spatial data science, the Plumbing Poverty Project is the first of its kind to explore the social geography of incomplete water and sanitation provision in the USA and Mexico. A two-time Fulbright scholar and former Peace Corps Volunteer, Meehan earned her bachelor's degree from the University of Oregon and graduate degrees from the University of Oxford and the University of Arizona. She is on the leadership team of the NSF-sponsored Household Water Insecurity (HWISE) Network, which seeks to catalyze social science discovery at the intersection of policy and practice.

Dr Leslie-Anne Duvic-Paoli is Lecturer in Law at The Dickson Poon School of Law and the Deputy Director of its Climate Law and Governance Hub. She is also a Fellow of the Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance (C-EENRG) and Assistant Editor for the Transnational Environmental Law journal (Cambridge University Press). Leslie-Anne is a public international lawyer, with expertise in international environmental law, including climate and energy law. She is particularly interested in understanding the nature and content of environmental principles: her monograph, entitled The Prevention Principle in International Environmental Law, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2018. Leslie-Anne’s research also looks at the energy transition to a low-carbon economy from an international and comparative law perspective. She works on the global legal implications of energy democratisation and the importance of participatory mechanisms in the design of inclusive energy systems. 

Dr Elena Sitnikova is an academic and researcher, and Program Coordinator for the Master of Cyber Security program at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Canberra, at the Australian Defence Academy. This Master program is the fastest growing postgraduate program at UNSW Canberra with student numbers increasing from 60 to 350 between 2015 and 2018. In 2018, two courses that Elena coordinates, Cyber Governance and Information Assurance became the first PLuS Alliance offerings from UNSW Canberra to Arizona State University. Elena leads a Critical Infrastructure Protection research group and publishes widely in the area of intrusion detection (IDS) for SCADA control systems cyber security and industrial IoT. Elena is also involved in education research and publishes in the area of engineering and ICT education. Elena is an award winning academic, holding a national Australian Office for Learning and Teaching (OLT) Team Citation award for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning.

Dr Ang Liu is a senior lecturer at the UNSW Faculty of Engineering and the inaugural Director of the NAE Grand Challenges Scholars Program. His research focuses on engineering design and engineering education, where he has published over 50 journal and conference papers. Dr Liu teaches design thinking to students and design practitioners and was the first Program Manager of the Viterbi iPodia Education program at the University of Southern California. At UNSW he also serves on the Engineering Faculty Board, Engineering Education Innovation Committee, Education Quality Assurance Committee and Humanitarial Engineering Committee. He is closely involved with many professional organisations such as the American Society of Mechanical Engineeers (ASME), the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) and after being a Research Affiliate of CIRP (International Academy of Production Engineering) he is currently a nominee for one of the 150 Associate Memberships. Dr Liu is also the General Chair of the 13th Internaitonal Conference on Axiomatic Design in October 2019.

Associate Professor Kearnes is an ARC Future Fellow in Environmental Humanities, UNSW. He is a CI in the ARC CoE in Convergent Bio-Nano Science and Technology, leading research focused on the societal dimensions of nanomedicine. Situated between the fields of Science and Technology Studies (STS), human geography and environmental humanities, his research focuses on the social and political dimensions of technological and environmental change. His co-edited volume Remaking Participation: Science, Environment and Emergent Publics (Routledge, 2016) was awarded the 2018 Amsterdamska Prize by the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST). He serves on the editorial board of Science, Technology and Society (Sage) and is an associate editor of Science as Culture (Taylor & Francis). He is co-convenor of the 2018 conference of the Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S), and has held visiting positions at School of Geography, Oxford University (2015) and the Department of Sociology, Lancaster University (2011).

Oliver Bown is senior lecturer and co-director of the Interactive Media Lab at UNSW Art & Design. He is a researcher and maker working with creative technologies, with a diverse academic background spanning social anthropology, evolutionary and adaptive systems, music informatics and interaction design, with a parallel career in electronic music and digital art spanning over 15 years. He is interested in how artists, designers and musicians use advanced computing technologies to produce complex creative works. His current active research areas include media multiplicites, musical metacreation, the theories and methodologies of computational creativity, new interfaces for musical expression, and multi-agent models of social creativity. He is a member of the advisory board for the International Conference on Computational Creativity, and the organising committee for the Musical Metacreation series of workshops and concerts and is a program committee member for the conference NIME and GECCO (art track) amongst others.

Professor Ramburuth teaches and researches in Cross-Cultural Management and Emerging Economies and publishes widely in these areas. Her leadership positions include Immediate Past President of the Academic Board, Associate Dean Education and Undergraduate Programs, Head of School (Management), and Director, Business School Education Development Centre. She is on the editorial board of the Academy of Management Learning and Education (A*), Journal for Multicultural Education, International Journal of Emerging Markets and Chinese Management Studies. She is Academic Lead Africa in the Institute for Global Development, and oversees projects in Transformative Academic Development (which she delivers), Health and Medical Education, Peace and Conflict, and Student Exchange at Gulu University, Uganda. She is collaborating with the Ugandan Ministry of Education to deliver Academic Development and Leadership programs at universities across Uganda, and aims to offer the programs at universities in Rwanda, Kenya, Malawi, Ethiopia, South Africa, via online and blended learning modes of delivery. 

Associate Professor kylie valentine conducts policy relevant research on human services design and delivery with a focus on families and children. Current and recent projects include the evaluation of the NSW Integrated Domestic and Family Violence Service, a study of best practice in early intervention violence prevention for women and children with disability, a review of Australian Safe at Home projects, and a qualitative study of housing pathways after domestic and family violence.

Justine Nolan is an Associate Professor and Associate Dean (Academic) in the Faculty of Law at UNSW Sydney. She is a Visiting Professorial Scholar at NYU. Her research focuses on business and human rights and she is one of the world’s leading scholars in the field. She teaches across a variety of courses including international human rights and business and human rights. She developed the Law Faculty’s first online course in 2017. She is on several NGO advisory boards and has acted as an expert advisory member for Australian government advisory bodies including most recently in 2017. Prior to her appointment at UNSW in 2004 she was the Director of the Business and Human Rights Program at Human Rights First in the US. She is an editor of the Australian Journal of Human Rights and the Business and Human Rights Journal.

Professor Tony Butler is a leading expert on the health of offenders and has developed numerous policy-relevant projects in the justice health area. He is the program head of the Justice Health Research Program at the Kirby Institute and leads a team of twelve researchers including PhD and post-doctoral researchers. He is an NHMRC Principal; Research Fellow. He developed Australia’s only two national offender health data collection initiatives including the National Prison Entrants Bloodborne Virus Survey. He has led novel studies examining mental illness among prisoners, the role of head injury in offending, an RCT of a pharmacotherapy-based trial for impulsive-violent offenders, and text mining police domestic violence event narratives. He leads the NHMRC-funded Australian Centre for Offender Health Research. More recently he has developed two teaching initiative: ‘Public Health and Corrections’ aimed the nexus between health and criminology, and the popular ‘Inside the Criminal Mind’ course.

Dr Padmanesan Narsimhan is a medical doctor with a public health masters and research degree from UNSW Australia. He has a strong interest in utilizing digital health tools to strengthen health systems, especially among vulnerable and disadvantaged communities in rural and remote areas. Padma also leads research programs in Integrated management of diseases using mobile health in India and teaches rural and remote International health at UNSW. He also currently serve as the Assistant Director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for eHealth at UNSW.

Professor de Leeuw is active in the Healthy Cities movement since 1986. Director of WHO Collaborating Centre for Research on Healthy Cities (1992-2001). She assists WHO regionally and globally in Healthy City evaluation, reporting, accountability. Known for her strong engagement with local health policies and politics and a welcome speaker at local community and global research events. She continues to be WHO European Research Director for Healthy Cities. Recent grant income (CIHR Canada, WHO) for $2M. Evelyne is Editor-in-Chief of the international peer-reviewed journal Health Promotion International and considered a leading global health promotion scholar, as evidenced by her appointments to high-level research panels (e.g., the Academy of Finland, and Science Ministries in Japan and Germany). Published several books (Healthy Cities - WHO and Springer; health promotion political science - OUP; consumer health democratisation - Edward Elgar) and over 120 peer-reviewed articles, plus several dozen book chapters.

Professor Judith Green is Chair in Sociology of Health at King’s College London. Her research interests are in the sociology of public health, with a recent focus on the relationships between transport systems and health; questions of how evidence travels from one setting to another; and methodological development.  She is co-PI of the Social Sciences and Urban Public Health Institute (SUPHI).   Professor Green edits the journal Critical Public Health, and is co-author of the textbook Qualitative Methods for Health Research. She joined King’s in 2016, following posts at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London South Bank University and the United Medical and Dental Schools (UMDS) of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals. Professor Green has an undergraduate degree in Anthropology and an MSc and PhD in sociology as applied to medicine.

Dr Leigh Aldous is a Senior Lecturer in Chemistry at King’s College London. He obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry & Chemical Engineering from Queen’s University Belfast in 2007, after which he was a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at Queen’s University Belfast and the University of Oxford. In late 2011 he moved to UNSW Sydney to start his own research group, where he is currently an adjunct Senior Lecturer. He has been a Senior Lecturer at King’s College London since 2017 and his research interests include Thermo-electrochemistry and Biomass Utilisation (for waste energy harvesting and sustainability). He is currently investigating the conversion of chemicals into useful energy and combines this with the principles of ‘green chemistry’ or ‘sustainable chemistry.’

Dr Eka Ikpe is a Lecturer in Development Economics in Africa at King’s College London and the International Lead for the African Leadership Centre and the King’s Department of International Development. She has participated in a range of policy influencing projects including: contributing to a UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Africa Report on UK Trade with Africa in a Post-BREXIT era; co-authoring a research study on security and development in the Sahel for the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa; training of Liberian legislators on security sector reform oversight; contributing to the Economic Community of West African States Conflict Prevention Framework and co-authoring the Women Peace and Security Action Plan.  She is on the Advisory Committee for Understanding and Supporting Creative Economies in Africa: Education, Networks and Policy Research Network (funded by the AHRC) and is on the editorial review board of the Journal of Leadership and Developing Societies. She holds a PhD in Economics from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.

Professor Bronwyn Parry is a Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine at King’s College London and Head of the School of Global Affairs. Her primary research interests lie in investigating how human-environment relations are being recast by technological, economic and regulatory change.  She has developed expertise in a number of key areas: the rise and operation of the life sciences industry, informationalism, the commodification of life forms, posthumanism, applied bioethics, legal approaches to the regulation of nature, and the public understanding and reception of science. Professor Parry has undertaken comparative work on the role of international regulatory regimes, and acted as a consultant for the UN and the UK government in this capacity. She was awarded a major grant from the Wellcome Trust to investigate the social, ethical, and legal complexities of human tissue banks in the UK and has completed a collaborative international bioethics project that investigates the production, consumption, and regulation of assisted reproductive services in rural and urban centers within India.

Professor Stephen Loo is Professor of Interdisciplinary Design and Art at UNSW Sydney. For more than 25 years, Stephen has researched, taught and practiced in the transdisciplinary nexus of art, architecture, design, philosophy, performance and science. He has published widely on biophilosophy, posthumanist ethics, ecological humanities and experimental digital thinking. Recent books include Deleuze and Architecture(2012) and Poetic Biopolitics (2016) and he is currently working on Speculative Ethologies (2018 with Dr Undine Sellbach). Stephen is a founding partner of award-winning design, architecture, interpretation and exhibition practice Mulloway Studio. He has a performance-philosophy based art practice and has shown internationally in Paris, Berlin, London, Sydney and Adelaide. Stephen has played a key role in national and international policy settings in architecture and design education as a past Chair of the National Education Committee, Australian Institute of Architects (AIA), and President of the Australian Deans of the Built Environment and Design (ADBED).

Joni Adamson is a President’s Professor of Environmental Humanities in the Department of English and Director of the Environmental Humanities Initiative (EHI) at Arizona State University. She is the author and/or co-editor of American Indian Literature, Environmental Justice and Ecocriticism (University of Arizona Press, 2001), The Environmental Justice Reader (University of Arizona Press, 2002), American Studies, Ecocriticism, and Ecology (Routledge, 2013), Keywords for Environmental Studies (New York University Press, 2016), Ecocriticism and Indigenous Studies—Conversations from Earth to Cosmos (Routledge 2017) and Humanities for the Environment (Routledge 2017). She lectures internationally and has published over 80 articles, chapters, blogs and reviews. Her work has been supported by many awards and grants, including most recently, the 2019 Benjamin N. Duke Fellowship at the National Humanities Center in North Carolina. She is Secretary General of the Humanities for the Environment global network and served as President of the world’s largest environmental humanities organization, The Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE), in 2012.

Dr. Vivoni is a hydrologist whose is interested in the interactions of water in the lithosphere, biosphere and atmosphere. His current research focuses on land surface ecohydrological processes in the semiarid southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, in particular during the summer monsoon season. Current field efforts include a small watershed study of ecohydrological interactions in the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge, a regional basin study of the hydroclimatological impact of vegetation greening in the Rio Sonora in Mexico, and the study of the short and long-term effects of vegetation changes on the hydrological response in basins of northern New Mexico. In these studies, field observations and remote sensing data are used in conjunction with a distributed model to explore the underlying hydrological mechanisms and provide relevant predictions at the watershed scale. This research involves data analyses of observations, numerical modeling using parallel computing, and synthesis activities to test relevant hypotheses.

Dr. Kurt VanLehn is the Diane and Gary Tooker Chair for Effective Education in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University. He received a Ph. D. from MIT in 1983 in Computer Science, was a post-doc at BBN and Xerox PARC, joined the faculty of Carnegie-Mellon University in 1985, moved to the University of Pittsburgh in 1990 and joined ASU in 2008. He founded and co-directed two large NSF research centers (Circle; the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center). He has published over 125 peer-reviewed publications, is a fellow in the Cognitive Science Society, and is on the editorial boards of Cognition and Instruction and the International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education. Dr. VanLehn's research focuses on intelligent tutoring systems, classroom orchestration systems, and other intelligent interactive instructional technology.

Dr. Sarah Stabenfeldt received her B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Saint Louis University and her Ph.D. in Bioengineering from Georgia Institute of Technology. She was awarded an NIH NRSA pre-doctoral fellowship for her doctoral thesis research on developing neural tissue engineering therapies for traumatic brain injury. As a NIH post-doctoral fellow at Emory University School of Medicine and Georgia Tech, she investigated fibrin-derived peptide-protein binding interactions, designing fibrin-based wound healing therapeutics. She joined Arizona State University’s School of Biological and Health Systems Engineering as an Assistant Professor in 2011 and leads her research team in developing regenerative medicine strategies for acute neural injury. Since joining ASU, Sarah has been awarded the Arizona Biomedical Research Consortium Early Stage Investigator Award, the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, and NSF CAREER Award.

Professor Anna Scaglione’s expertise spans the areas of statistical signal processing for communication, electric power systems and information networks. Her main research objective is advancing intelligent infrastructure, through information systems and data analysis. Specific topics include decentralized information processing in sensor networks and among social agents as well as cyber-security and demand response for reliable energy delivery.  She is a fellow of the IEEE, recipient of the 2013 IEEE Fink Award and 2000 Best paper award in the IEEE Signal Processing Society. 

Dr. Larkey’s research interests include testing theory-based methods of communicating health messages to underserved/low-income populations, community-based participatory research practices, and examining mind-body methods of alleviating symptoms in cancer survivors.

Dr. Goodnick is Deputy Director of ASU LightWorks. Steve Goodnick is an expert in solid-state device physics, semi-conductor transport, quantum and nanostructure devices and device technology, and high frequency devices. Goodnick is also the director of Arizona Institute for Renewable Energy (AIRE). Goodnick previously served as the interim deputy dean for the Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering at ASU, and earlier as chair of the Fulton School’s Department of Electrical Engineering, and served as President of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department Heads Association from 2003-2004. Germany, Japan and Italy are among the countries he has served as a visiting scientist.  Goodnick is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow. Other honors and awards he has received include the IEEE Phoenix Section Society Award for Outstanding Service (2002), the Colorado State University College of Engineering Achievement in Academia Award (1998), and the College of Engineering Research Award (Oregon State University, 1996). His publication record includes more than 165 refereed journal articles, books and book chapters related to transport in semiconductor devices and microstructures.

Dr. Davies is a British-born theoretical physicist, cosmologist, astrobiologist and best-selling author. He is Regents' Professor and Director of the Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science, co-Director of the Cosmology Initiative, and Principal Investigator in the Center for the Convergence of Physical Science and Cancer Biology, all at Arizona State University. He helped create the theory of quantum fields in curved spacetime, with which he provided explanations for how black holes can radiate energy, and what caused the ripples in the cosmic afterglow of the big bang. In astrobiology, he was a forerunner of the theory that life on Earth may have come from Mars. He is currently championing the theory that Earth may host a shadow biosphere of alternative life forms. In addition to his research, Davies is known as a passionate science communicator, and is in demand world-wide for media appearances and public presentations.

Dr. Baral is Professor and Chair of the School of Computing and Informatics Professor at Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering and Department of Biomedical Informatics, Biomedicine.  Dr. Baral’s expertise is in Bioinformatics Knowledge representation, reasoning and declarative problem solving. A systematic approach to designing and analyzing autonomous agents.

Dr Harding is a Reader in Palliative Care at King's College London and has a number of collaborations with African palliative care leaders that has brought change in outcome measure for research and clinical practice as well has significantly grown the evidence base. Dr Harding’s research areas include outcome measurement and tool validation, HIV/AIDS, heart failure, family caregivers, sub-Saharan Africa, Global Health, audit and quality improvement, mixed methods, intervention development and testing.

Dr Megan Bowman began her career in Australia as a solicitor at a top-tier commercial law firm and then subsequently at a non-profit environmental law organisation. Her expertise focuses on transnational analyses of commercial and financial regulation, climate finance, corporate ethics, and optimal regulatory design which accounts for both the levers and limits of law and policy.

Dr Kyle Dyer is a Senior Lecturer in Addiction Science at Kings College London, and the Academic Lead for Education and Training within the Department of Addiction (KCL). Dr Dyer’s research interests include the application of oral fluid for therapeutic drug monitoring, harms associated with the use of methamphetamine, the relationship between alcohol and drug concentration and psycho-behavioural and cognitive impairment and factors impacting upon the translation of research into practice.

Dr George Adamson is an interdisciplinary geographer with specialisms that span the physical, social and cultural dimensions of geography, particularly climate. His research calls for a greater attention to pre-industrial or 'natural climate variability' and also an appreciation of the deeper historical interrelationship of climate and society.

Professor Simon Killcross is Head of the School of Psychology at UNSW. He received a BA and PhD in Experimental Psychology from the University of Cambridge, before taking up a research fellowship at Magdalene College Cambridge. He was appointed a lecturer in Psychology at the University of York in 1996, and Senior Research Fellow at Cardiff University in 1999. He was appointed Professor and Deputy Head of the School of Psychology at Cardiff before moving to UNSW as Head of School in 2009. His research examines preclinical models of fronto-striatal function, as well as translational models of human mental disorders such as schizophrenia. He has published over 100 journal articles and book chapters, and has received research funding from major government granting agencies (e.g. ARC, NHRMC in Australia, BBSRC, MRC in the UK), international charities (e.g. NARSAD, Wellcome Trust) and industry partners (e.g. Lilly, Wyeth, MSD).

Professor Nick Wailes is Associate Dean (Digital and Innovation) at UNSW Business School and Academic Director of AGSM’s specialised online MBA, MBAX. Nick’s role is to the lead the digital transformation of the Business School. Prior to joining UNSW Nick was the MBA Director at the University of Sydney Business School. Nick research interests including international and comparative employment relations and the impact of new and emerging technologies on organisation. Nick regularly comments in the media on how digital is reshaping traditional business models and industries
 

Lynne Bilston is a biomedical engineer whose research focuses on how mechanical forces are involved in physiological and pathophysiological processes in the body. Her research encompasses injury biomechanics, neural and other soft tissue biomechanics, and the development of novel imaging methods for making mechanical measurements in vivo. She has a PhD in bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania and is a National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia senior research fellow. She is a Senior Principal Research Fellow at Neuroscience Research Australia, and is a conjoint Professor at the University of New South Wales.

Professor Cameron Holley is the Co-Director of Postgraduate Studies at UNSW Law, Chair of the Environmental Law Research Cluster at UNSW Law and a member of the leadership teams of the Connected Waters Initiative Research Centre and the Global Water Institute, UNSW. His research is in the areas of environmental law and water governance. Within these fields, he has examined issues of compliance and enforcement, environmental security, resilience, democratic participation, adaptive management and collaborative governance. An empirical researcher, Cameron works closely with international government and non-government organisations on research projects. His current agenda is centred on water law and energy governance (under an ARC Discovery) and identifying best practices in the regulation of water scarcity by comparing laws in Europe, USA and Australia. In 2014, he was awarded the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law Scholarship Award for my contribution to environmental law scholarship.

Jill Bennett is Professor and Director of the National Institute for Experimental Arts (NIEA) at UNSW Art & Design. Her research and practice focuses on interdisciplinary arts-led approaches to the study of human experience. She leads the Memory Lab at NIEA, and is currently investigating (with a team of cognitive neuropsychologists and artists) the use of immersive visualisation technologies to assist memory retrieval. Her most recent projects have focused on memory loss and amnesia, building on earlier pioneering work on art and traumatic memory. Through her books (such as Empathic Vision, 2005 and Practical Aesthetics, 2012) and a series of exhibitions/public projects, she has investigated the way that art engenders productive forms of empathy and social connection. She now works on “engagement science”—designing multidisciplinary research projects, which interface with the public in innovative ways. She is currently developing a major festival of arts and mental health, focused on the theme of Anxiety.

Professor Tinney is founder and head of Exoplanetary Science at UNSW.  His research is focused specifically on the use of high-precision technologies for the discovery and study of planets orbiting other stars, with his team being directly responsible for the discovery of over 50 exoplanets – most notably including the closest potentially habitable planet discovered orbiting the nearby star Wolf 1061 in 2015.  Professor Tinney is closely involved with a number of professional organisations, chairing the Optical Telescopes Advisory Committee of Astronomy Australia Limited for over 5 years, and serving on the Giant Magellan Telescope Organizations Science Advisory Committee from 2009-2016.  He is a past Director of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology based at UNSW, providing a broad and interdisciplinary context for his team’s research on the most likely platforms for life orbiting other stars.

Professor Bennett Moses is from the Faculty of Law. Her research explores issues around the relationship between technology and law, including the types of legal issues that arise as technology changes, how these issues are addressed in Australia and other jurisdictions, the application of standard legal categories such as property in new socio-technical contexts, the use of technologically-specific and sui generis legal rules, and the problems of treating “technology” as an object of regulation.  She works extensively around the use of Big Data and data analytics used for law enforcement and national security purposes. Lyria is involved with IEEE (an international engineering professional association) and currently serves as Chair of the Australia Chapter of the IEEE Society on the Social Implications of Technology.

Professor Scott Kable is the Head of Chemistry at the University of New South Wales. His research is focussed at understanding fundamental reaction mechanisms and reaction intermediates in the gas phase, with a particular emphasis on atmospheric processes. Professor Kable is also a passionate teacher and educator. He is a founding Director of the Advancing Science by Enhanced Laboratory Learning (ASELL) Project, which shares best practice and provides professional development in laboratory education to chemistry, physics and biology academics around the country. Prof Kable is on the Board of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute and has twice served on the Australian Research Council College of Experts.

Professor Luca Viganò is a Professor in Computer Science (Software Modelling and Applied Logic). He is also ViceDean (International) for Natural and Mathematical Sciences, promoting international collaboration throughout the Faculty. His research interests include formal Methods for security, security logics, security testing, and labelled deduction for non-classical logics (modal logics, sub structural logics, etc.) and the combination of logics.

Professor Chris Roberts Is the first PLuS Alliance Professor, a role which will facilitate PLuS Alliance activities through innovation and entrepreneurship. Professor Roberts has extensive experience in the biomedical devices industry, and previously led one of the major companies in this area, Cochlear, an Australian-based multinational. He has also had experience in renal (dialysis), orthopaedics (electrical bone growth simulation), cardiology (pacemakers) and respiratory and sleep medicine (CPAP and ventilation). Each of these areas has been driven by innovation on a global scale. Professor Roberts is a non-executive director of ResMed Inc and a member of the Jobs NSW Board, NSW Innovation and Productivity Council, Monash University Industry Council of Advisors, University of Technology Sydney Vice-Chancellor’s Industry Advisory Board, UNSW’s Faculty of Medicine Advisory Council, the Health Innovation Advisory Committee (a principal committee of the National Health and Medical Research Council), and a member of the Board of Governors of the Centenary Institute of Cancer Medicine and Cell Biology. He holds a BE (Honours) in chemical engineering (UNSW), an MBA (Macquarie University) and a PhD (UNSW) and has been awarded Honorary Doctor of Science degrees from both Macquarie and UNSW. He was recipient of the Charles Copeman Medal from the HR Nicholls Society for service to freedom of employment and is also a Fellow of the Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and Honorary Fellow of the Institution of Engineers Australia. In 2015, he was Engineer Australia’s  Professional Engineer of the year.

Barry Bozeman, PhD, is Arizona Centennial Professor of public management and technology policy and the director of the Center of Organizational Research and Design at Arizona State University. Bozeman also serves as the director of the School of Public Affairs.

Most of Bozeman’s research primarily focuses on public management, organization theory, and science and technology policy. His practitioner experience includes a position at the National Science Foundation’s Division of Information Technology and a visiting position at the Science and Technology Agency’s National Institute of Science and Technology Policy. He also has served as a consultant to a variety of federal and state agencies in the US, including the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Commerce, the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Energy. Bozeman has helped in the design and evaluation of the national innovation systems of the Republic of South Africa, Canada, New Zealand, France, Israel, Chile, and Argentina.

Andrew Maynard, PhD, is a Professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University and director of the Risk Innovation Lab, a unique center focused on transforming how we think about and act on risk, in the pursuit of increasing and maintaining value. Professor Maynard was previously chair of the Environmental Health Sciences department at the University of Michigan.

Maynard’s research and professional activities focus on risk innovation and the responsible development and use of emerging technologies, including nanotechnology and synthetic biology. He is widely published and has a regular column for the Journal of Nature Nanotechnology. Maynard has served on National Academy panels and has testified before congressional committees. He is co-chair of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Nanotechnology and is a member of its metacouncil. 

David Guston, PhD, is the founding director of the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and interim co-director of the Institute for the Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University. Professor Guston is co-director of ASU’s Consortium for Science, Policy, and Outcomes, where he is principal investigator and director of the Center for Nanotechnology in Society. He also is a senior sustainability scientist for the Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU.

Guston’s research interests include societal aspects of emerging technologies, responsible innovation, anticipatory governance, technology assessment, and public engagement in science and technology. He is published and cited on research and development policy, technology assessment, public participation in science and technology, and the politics of science policy. His book, Between Politics and Science: Assuring the Integrity and Productivity of Research was awarded the Don K. Price Prize by the American Political Science Association for best book in science and technology policy. In addition to co-authoring several publications, Guston is also the founding editor-in-chief of the Journal of Responsible Innovation.

Professor Pettit is the inaugural Chair of Urban Science (2015) at UNSW Sydney, being previously at the University Melbourne (20011-2015). The State Government of Victoria, (2004-2011) and RMIT University (2002-2004).  He is responsible for the Digital Cities course at UNSW. He previously developed the Urban Informatics course at the University of Melbourne and was the lead author on the ESRI online virtual campus course in GIS and Planning which attracted more than 3,000 students between 2000 and 2010. His educational background has been focused specifically on the fields of spatial planning and GIS at the undergraduate and postgraduate level.  His Ph.D. examined the using of GIS and mapping technologies for undertaking scenario planning at the land parcel level across municipalities.  Professor Pettit is closely involved with a number of professional organisations.  He is a member of the Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute (SSSI) and the Planning Institute of Australia (PIA).

Professor Kingsford is Director of the Centre for Ecosystem Science at UNSW Sydney. Good management of river systems is dependent on good information of the ecological responses and a long history of monitoring the breeding of waterbirds in the Macquarie Marshes is producing dividends. The Macquarie Marshes is now established as the most important site in Australia for the breeding of colonial waterbirds (herons, egrets and ibis). The project monitors the impacts of changing water regimes on the breeding and abundance of waterbirds in the Macquarie Marshes.  In October of each year Professor Kingsford conducts an aerial survey to estimate the abundance of waterbirds in eastern Australia. This project is one of the largest surveys of fauna in the world.

Professor Fleur Johns is a Professor in Law at UNSW Sydney and publishes widely in the areas of international law, socio-legal studies and legal theory.  Currently, she is engaged in new work on the use of data analytics in humanitarian aid and development work.  She has served as Articles Editor of the Leiden Journal of International Law.  She was Co-Director of the Sydney Centre for International Law at the University of Sydney and also been Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto, a Leverhulme Visiting Fellow at Birkbeck College (University of London) and she has been invited to be Shimizu Visiting Professor of Law at the LSE in London.  Prior to commencing her academic career, she practised as a corporate lawyer with Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, in New York, specialising in international project finance.

Professor Eileen Baldry is Chair of Criminology in Social Sciences, at UNSW Sydney.  She has pioneered multidisciplinary research and teaching in social justice and equity across social policy, criminology, disability studies, housing and homelessness, Indigenous studies and international, social and community development. In particular, Eileen’s teaching, research and publications focus on social justice matters including mental health and cognitive disability in the criminal justice system; education, training and employment for prisoners and ex-prisoners; homelessness and transition from prison; Indigenous social work; community development and social housing; and disability services.  Professor Baldry was awarded NSW Justice Medal for improving access to justice for vulnerable people. She was shortlisted in the category of Innovation in the 2016 Australian Financial Review's 100 Women of Influence.

Dr Jenny Driscoll is the Child Studies Lecturer and Programme Director and Barrister at Law. Her research interests cover the protection and rights of vulnerable children, in particular the child protection ‘system’; the education of looked-after children; ethical issues arising from research with vulnerable children and young people; and the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in the UK. She has recently completed a longitudinal study of the educational transitions of looked after young people aged 15-18.

Yasmin Saikia, PhD, is a Professor of History and the Hardt-Nickachos Chair in peace studies at the Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict at Arizona State University. Prior to joining ASU in 2010, professor Saikia taught at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill and Carleton College, Minnesota. She has strong ties with the academic community in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Malaysia.

Saikia’s research and teaching interests straddle peace studies, history, and religion with a focus on gender issues, conflict transformation, and Islamic values. 

Professor Worth is the Head of the International HIV Research Group in the School of Public Health and Community Medicine, at UNSW Sydney.  Professor Worth’s research has been primarily in the area of HIV social and behavioural research in Asia and the Pacific, with a focus on gender, sexuality and global HIV. Professor Worth’s research activities span many areas of Global Health including understanding HIV in China: the Social Aspects of the Epidemic Mobility; HIV risk across the Papua New Guinea/Indonesia border; and strengthening HIV social research capacity amongst HIV social research leaders in Papua New Guinea and Fiji.

Professor Raina MacIntyre (MBBS Hons 1, M App Epid, PhD, FRACP, FAFPHM) is Head, School of Public Health and Community Medicine, UNSW and Professor of Infectious Diseases Epidemiology. She leads a research program in control and prevention of infectious diseases, spanning epidemiology, biosecurity, risk analysis, personal protective equipment, vaccinology, mathematical modelling, public health and clinical trials. Her global health research includes collaborations in India, Vietnam and China. She has over 300 peer reviewed publications in peer reviewed journals. She has received many awards including the Sir Henry Wellcome Medal and Prize from the Association of Military Surgeons of the US in 2007 for her work on bioterrorism, the Public Health Association of Australia’s National Immunisation Award in 2014, and the 2003 Frank Fenner Award for Research in Infectious Diseases. She has sat on numerous national and international expert committees and editorial boards in her field, including the US IOM. She currently heads a NHMRC Centre for Research Excellence in Epidemic Response and UNSW Vaccine and Infections Research Lab (UNSW-VIRL). She is also a founding director of ARM, Australia’s only national epidemic response network. She is an adjunct professor at Arizona State University and in this role is the UNSW lead in collaborative research and teaching in public health security within the PLuS Alliance.

Professor Bryant is Director of the Traumatic Stress Clinic and Scientia Professor of Psychology at UNSW Sydney. His research has focused on identification of people at risk of mental health problems after trauma, early intervention strategies, treatment strategies for posttraumatic stress, and complicated grief.  His research has resulted in many national and international awards. He was elected to Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia in 2005, and he also holds an ARC Professorial Fellowship.  Professor Bryant also works on many major national and international projects, including developing the Australian NHMRC PTSD treatment guidelines, web treatments for US troops returning from Iraq, tsunami survivors in Thailand, developing counselling programs for disaster survivors in the USA after Hurricane Katrina, and web-based treatments for complicated grief patients in the USA.

YouTube interview December 2020 

Richard Bryant, Scientia Professor of Psychology at UNSW Sydney in conversation with Paul Ramadge

Stephen Challacombe is a Professor of Oral Medicine Department of Mucosal & Salivary Biology at the Dental Institute. He has a long term enthusiasm for clinical and translational research and has supervised (and examined!) many PhD students in the fields of mucosal immunology, oral microbiology and oral medicine, fields in which he has published extensively. He has a long term interest in oral manifestations of HIV and chairs an international steering committee which oversees world workshops embracing basic, translational and clinical research in HIV and which has led to an internationally accepted classification on the oral manifestations.

Matthew Scotch is Associate Professor in the College of Health Solutions and Assistant Director of the Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering at ASU. He is also Senior Visiting Fellow at UNSW’s Kirby Institute where he did his sabbatical with Dr. Raina MacIntyre (PLuS Fellow) in 2018. His focus within PLuS is in global health and biosecurity of infectious diseases including influenza and SARS-CoV-2. He has collaborated with PLuS Fellows Raina MacIntyre (UNSW) and Kathleen Steinhofel (KCL) on avian influenza risk. This work has been funded by the PLuS Alliance through seed grants and accelerator awards.

His research focuses on virus phylogeography to study the spread of RNA viruses with a focus influenza A viruses. His lab group is also interested in the molecular epidemiology of RNA viruses including the amplification and next-generation sequencing (NGS) of influenza A genes for studying spread among avian and human hosts.

Nancy Gonzales, PhD, is Executive Vice President and Provost of ASU. An alumna of ASU, Professor Gonzales earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology. She received her PhD from the University of Washington. Gonzales is also the co-director at the Prevention Research Center, which focuses on preventative interventions for children who are at risk of developing mental health problems because of exposure to the high-stress situations of parental divorce, parental death, and inner-city Mexican American children in transition to high school.

Gonzales’ research examines cultural and contextual influences in social, academic, and psychological development of youth across their lifespan. The aims of this work are to translate findings into community-based interventions that are effective at promoting successful adaptation and reducing social inequalities and health disparities for high-risk populations.

Elizabeth Wentz, PhD, is Dean of Social Sciences in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University. Professor Wentz also serves as a Professor and director of the School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning and President of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science.

In 1997, she came to ASU to focus on the design, implementation, and evaluation of Geographic Information Science technologies, such as geographic information systems, remote sensing, and spatial analysis. Wentz's most current projects concentrate on water resource management and urban remote sensing.

Kerry Smith, PhD, is an emeritus regents’ professor and emeritus professor of economics for the W.P. Carey School of Business as Arizona State University and is a distinguished sustainability scientist for the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability. Professor Smith also directs the Center for Environmental Economics and Sustainability Policy in the L. William Seidman Research Institute, which serves as a link between the local, national, and international business communities and the W.P. Carey School of Business.

Before joining ASU in 2006, Smith was a distinguished professor and the director of the Center for Environmental and Resource Economic Policy at North Carolina State University.

Smith is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a university fellow at Resources for the Future, a nonprofit think tank based in Washington, D.C. He is also a fellow of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists and of the American Agricultural Economics Association.

Smith has a bachelor’s degree and doctorate from Rutgers University. His research interests include economics, modeling and simulation, land use and land cover, econometrics, climate change and adaptation, and conservation policy.

Christiana Honsberg, PhD, joined the electrical engineering faculty at Arizona State University (ASU) in 2008 and is a professor in the School of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering at ASU. Professor Honsberg also is a senior sustainability scientist for the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute for Sustainability at the university.

Honsberg holds a BS, MS, and PhD from the University of Delaware. Prior to joining the ASU, she was an associate professor and director for the high performance solar power program at the University of Delaware. Honsberg’s research interests include solar energy systems, semiconductors and photodetectors. She currently holds one patent in the US, Japan, and Europe and three patents are pending.

Rimjhim Aggarwal, PhD, is an Associate Professor for the School of Sustainability at Arizona State University. Aggarwal’s research and teaching interests lie at the interface between sustainability science and international development. A central focus of her research has been on examining the links between globalization, resilience of social-ecological systems, and human wellbeing. Currently, Aggarwal is researching the emerging conflicts in the framing of water as a human right as well as an economic, ecological, and social good in rapidly urbanizing regions, with a focus on Delhi, São Paulo, and Johannesburg. She is also working on a National Science Foundation project on “Innovations in Food, Energy and Water Systems.” Aggarwal is a recipient of the Fulbright-Nehru fellowship for India. In recognition of her efforts in "use-inspired research" and "community outreach," she was awarded ASU’s President's Award for Sustainability in 2010. Aggarwal has also worked as a senior consultant for the United Nations University's World Institute for Development Economics Research and the World Bank.

Professor Reza Razavi is Director of Research at King’s Health Partners and Assistant Principal (Research and Innovation), King's College London. He is also the Leader of the Imaging and Biomedical Engineering Clinical Academic Group, Professor of Paediatric Cardiovascular Science and Consultant Cardiologist at Guy’s and St Thomas’ hospital. The main focus of his research is imaging and biomedical engineering related to the cardiovascular disease. One area of focus is cardiac MRI particularly in relation to congenital heart disease, electrophysiology and heart failure, image guided intervention, XMR (X-ray and MRI) guided cardiac catheterisation and methodological advances to move to faster 3-Dimensional cardiac imaging.

Professor Merlin Crossley was appointed Deputy Vice-Chancellor at UNSW Sydney in February 2016. He is a molecular biologist, specialising in human genetic disease. He is also an enthusiastic teacher and science communicator who contributes frequent articles on science, education and policy. Professor Crossley serves on the Trust of the Australian Museum, is Deputy Chair on the Board of the Australian Science Media Centre, sits on the Boards of the Sydney Institute of Marine Science and New South Innovations, is on the Council of the EMBL Australia, and Editorial Board of The Conversation. Professor Crossley undertook his BSc at the University of Melbourne, majoring in genetics and microbiology, moved to Oxford University supported by a Rhodes Scholarship, and then did post-doctoral research at Oxford and Harvard before taking up a position at The University of Sydney where he was Professor of Molecular Genetics 2005-9, Acting Dean of Science 2004, Director of Research for the College of Sciences and Technology 2005, and Acting Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research from 2006-8. In 2010 he began as Dean of Science at UNSW before taking up his current role in 2006.

Mark Searle is Executive Vice President and University Provost at Arizona State University and holds the rank of Professor in the School of Community Resources and Development. Prior to this current administrative appointment, Dr. Searle served as Interim University Provost, Deputy Provost and Chief of Staff, and Vice-President for Academic Personnel. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland. Earlier in his career at ASU, Mark served as the Founding Dean of the College of Human Services and as Vice President and Provost of ASU’s West campus.

Dr. Searle joined ASU after an extensive career in Canada where he was the Founding Director of the multidisciplinary Health, Leisure, and Human Performance Research Institute and head of an academic program in Recreation Studies at the University of Manitoba. Prior to his university appointment, Dr. Searle served in various management positions within municipal and provincial government. The Provincial Government of Manitoba, the National Therapeutic Recreation Society and the University of Manitoba have honored Dr. Searle for his achievements. He has been elected as a fellow of the Academy of Leisure Sciences and the Academy for Park and Recreation Administration. Dr. Searle is widely published on the relationship between leisure behaviour and the psychological well being of older adults.