The Steering Group

Mariette DiChristina, Steering Group chair, is editor in chief of Scientific American and executive vice president, Magazines and Research Services, for Springer Nature. From 2014 to 2016 she was vice chair of the Meta-Council on Emerging Technologies—one of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Councils.

Bernard S. Meyerson, Steering Group vice chair, is chief innovation officer emeritus at IBM. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering and a recipient of numerous awards for work spanning physics, engineering and business. He was the 2014–2016 chair of the World Economic Forum’s Meta-Council on Emerging Technologies and the 2016–2018 chair of the Forum’s Global Future Council on Advanced Materials. He remains engaged with several WEF efforts, such as “The Future of US Manufacturing” and “Innovation with a Purpose: Strengthening Food Systems through Technology.”

Jeff Carbeck, who has built several companies, is chief executive officer of 10EQS, which brings together independent top-tier consultants and specialized industry experts to help organizations increase growth and performance. He has served on the Forum’s Global Future Council on Advanced Materials (2016–2018), and a company he co-founded, MC10, is a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer.

Rona Chandrawati is a senior lecturer and head of the Nanotechnology for Food and Medicine Laboratory at the University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney) in Australia. Her research focuses on developing colorimetric nanosensors for disease diagnosis, food safety and environmental monitoring. She was a 2018 World Economic Forum’s Youngcientist and is in the Forum’s Expert Network. She has also served on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Biotechnology (2018–2019).

Seth Fletcher is chief features editor of Scientific American.

Javier Garcia Martinez is a professor of inorganic chemistry and director of the Molecular Nanotechnology Laboratory at the University of Alicante in Spain. He is a co-founder of Rive Technology (a Massachusetts Institute of Technology spin-off commercializing nanostructured catalysts for the chemical industry), a member of the Executive Committee of the International Union for Pure and Applied Chemistry, a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum and part of the Forum’s Expert Network. He has published extensively on nanomaterials, catalysis and energy. His books include Nanotechnology for the Energy Challenge and The Chemical Element: Chemistry’s Contribution to Our Global Future.

Hiroaki Kitano, an expert in artificial intelligence and systems biology, is president and chief executive officer of Sony Computer Science Laboratories and head of the Systems Biology Institute, both in Tokyo. He has served on several Global Future Councils of the World Economic Forum, including most recently the Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Council (2016-2019).

Corinna E. Lathan is co-founder and chief executive officer of AnthroTronix, a biomedical engineering research and development company creating products in digital health, wearable technology, robotics and augmented reality. She is also on the board of PTC, a provider of Internet of Things and augmented-reality platforms. Lathan was named a Young Global Leader and Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum. She was also the 2016–2018 chair of the Forum’s Global Future Council on Human Enhancement and continues to serve as a member on the Global Future Council on Healthy Longevity and Human Enhancement.

Geoffrey Ling, a retired U.S. Army colonel, is a professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins University and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. He is also interim vice chair of research in neurosciences at Inova Fairfax Medical Center and a partner of Ling and Associates. An expert in technology development and commercial transition, he has held leadership positions at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and, under President Barack Obama, in the White House Office of Science, Technology and Policy. He was a member of the World Economic Forum’s Council on Neurotechnologies (2016–2018).

Andrew Maynard is director of the Risk Innovation Lab at Arizona State University and author of Films from the Future: The Technology and Morality of Sci-Fi Movies. His work focuses on the responsible development and use of emerging technologies. He currently serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Agile Governance.

Elizabeth O’Day is CEO and founder of Olaris Therapeutics, a precision medicine company in Cambridge, Mass., and co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Biotechnologies. O’Day is founder of Lizzard Fashion, Proyecto Chispa, Women in Science and Technology, and PhiSB.

Sang Yup Lee, a co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Biotechnology since 2016, is Distinguished Professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and dean of KAIST Institutes. He holds more than 680 patents.

Guest Authors:

Mark Fischetti is a senior editor at Scientific American, where he concentrates on sustainability.

Alberto Moscatelli is a senior editor at Nature Nanotechnology, where he handles manuscripts in nanophotonics, among other areas. He has a Ph.D. in photochemistry from Columbia University.

Andrea Thompson, an associate editor at Scientific American, covers sustainability.