The Labs21 2010 Annual Conference will begin on Tuesday, September 28, with an opening plenary session to welcome all participants to the conference. On Thursday, September 30, a second plenary session will announce the Go Beyond Award winners and wrap up the conference.
Dr. Kerri-Ann Jones, Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, U.S. Department of State
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Dr. Jones |
Dr. Kerri-Ann Jones was sworn-in as assistant secretary of state for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs in August 2009.
Dr. Jones obtained her Bachelors Degree in chemistry from Columbia University and her Ph.D. from the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University. Prior to U.S. Government service, Dr. Jones worked as an independent consultant. She served for a year in New Delhi, India as the biotechnology advisor to the USAID mission. In 1985, she was the recipient of a Science Engineering and Diplomacy Fellowship from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
Dr. Jones has held several government positions. In her Senate-confirmed position as associate director at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), Dr. Jones was responsible for policy development, budget analysis, and interagency coordination of security and international science and technology issues. She testified before the Senate and served as interim director of the office. Dr. Jones also served on the National Security Council.
At USAID, Dr. Jones worked with the Science and Technology and the Asia Near East Bureaus. She directed the Division of Technical Resources and designed and managed the U.S. Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Partnership for Education, the first major U.S. contribution to APEC. She was instrumental in the initial design of the U.S.-Asia Environmental Partnership.
At NIH’s Fogarty International Center, Dr. Jones served as the program manager for biomedical programs in the Near East and South Asia region. Dr. Jones has also served as the director for the Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) for the state of Maine.
Her most recent position in federal government was as director of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Office of International Science and Engineering. Dr. Jones was responsible for coordinating NSF’s international activities. Under her leadership the Office of International Science and Engineering established the Partnership for International Research and Education.
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Dr. Trent |
Dr. Jonathan Trent is a senior scientist at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. After receiving his Ph.D. in biological oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Dr. Trent spent six years in Europe at the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Germany, the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, and the University of Paris at Orsay in France. He returned to the United States to work at the Boyer Center for Molecular Medicine at Yale Medical School for two years before establishing a biotechnology group at Argonne National Laboratory.
In 1998 he moved to NASA Ames Research Center to be part of NASA’s Astrobiology program and in 1999 he established the Protein Nanotechnology Group focused on building nanostructures using biomolecules from extremophiles—organisms adapted to extreme environments. In 2006, Dr. Trent was awarded the prestigious Nano50 award for Innovation in Nanotechnology. In addition to working at NASA, he is an adjunct professor in the Department of Biomolecular Engineering at the University of California at Santa Cruz, a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences.
In 2007, with support from Google, Dr. Trent assembled a team of scientists and engineers focused on GREEN (Global Research into Energy and the Environment at NASA). The GREEN team is developing a system for producing an inexhaustible, sustainable, carbon-neutral, solar-powered, economically viable feedstock for the oil refineries of the future. Dr. Trent’s recent research and inventions are focused on methods for obtaining alternative fuels, processing municipal wastewater, and economically producing freshwater by desalination.
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Mr. Dunham |
Mr. Dunham has spent 28 years with Schneider Electric in Poland, South Africa, the UK, and the U.S. Prior to joining Schneider Electric, Mr. Dunham received a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Oregon State University and served in the U.S. Coast Guard. He worked for Schneider Electric U.S. in varying capacities for 16 years before assuming the position of director of the buildings segment for Schneider Electric U.K. for three years. In 2005 he moved to the position of country manager for Schneider Electric South Africa, followed by two years as country manager for Schneider Electric Poland. He has since returned to the U.S. to serve as global solutions vice president—life sciences and industrial buildings out of Schneider Electric's Chicago office. Mr. Dunham has undertaken management development programs at Schneider Electric as well as Harvard and Kellogg's Business Schools.