天美传媒

Cristopher Moore received his B.A. in Physics, Mathematics, and Integrated Science from Northwestern University, and his Ph.D. in Physics from Cornell. From 2000 to 2012 he was a professor at the University of New Mexico, with joint appointments in Computer Science and Physics. Since 2012, Moore has been a resident professor at the Santa Fe Institute; he has also held visiting positions at 脡cole Polytechnique, Universit茅 Paris 7, 脡cole Normale Superieure du Lyon, the University of Michigan, and Northeastern University. He has published over 130 papers at the boundary between physics and computer science, ranging from quantum computing, to phase transitions in NP-complete problems, to the theory of social networks and efficient algorithms for analyzing their structure. He is an elected Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Mathematical Society. With Stephan Mertens, he is the author of The Nature of Computation from Oxford University Press.

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Toni Kutchan serves a vice president for research and is the Oliver M. Langenberg Distinguished Investigator at the Danforth Center where she is investigating two aspects of natural products that are found in plants; how plants produce medicinal natural products at the enzyme and gene level, which could lead to new sources of medications for use against conditions such as dementia and cancer; and the use of plant natural products as components of biofuels.

She is a leading expert in the molecules derived from the opium poppy, including the lifesaving opioid antidote medications. 鈥淧roduction of these drugs creates an industrial waste stream. It鈥檚 not good for the people working in the lab, and it creates a nasty waste pond. We have recently discovered a microorganism that can manufacture opiates in a cleaner, more sustainable way. Now we鈥檙e looking for industrial partners who can help us transform this lab work into an industry process.鈥�

As a recipient of federal research grants, the Danforth Center is prohibited from working on medical cannabis. However, Missouri recently legalized the production of industrial hemp, a crop which was king in Missouri in the late 1800s and which produces high-quality fiber useful in many products, such as textiles, rope, paper, and cosmetics. The Danforth Center and the Kutchan Lab are already forming partnerships. 鈥淲ith the cutting-edge technology and infrastructure at the Danforth Center, we can accelerate the breeding and help reestablish this useful cash crop in the state of Missouri. Hemp has been illegal for 100 years. We are now attempting to go from zero to introducing a modern crop.鈥�
 
Prior to joining the Center in 2006, she spent 20 years researching biochemistry at the University of Munich and the Leibniz Institute of Plant Biology.  In recognition of her scientific achievements, Toni was elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2017 and the prestigious German Academy of Sciences (Leopoldina) in 2010. She received her doctorate in biochemistry from Saint Louis University and a bachelor鈥檚 degree in chemistry from the Illinois Institute of Technology.
 
Toni credits training the next generation of scientists as a very rewarding part of her work at the Danforth Center and adds: 鈥淭raining the up-and-coming generations is so important, making sure they have broad interests and perspective. Together, we can make the world a better place, safer, more sustainable. By unlocking the secrets of plants, we will make peoples鈥� lives better鈥攁nd that鈥檚 a good feeling.鈥�
 

Kirk is an internationally renowned expert in bioimaging with 30 years鈥� experience and over 100 publications. He is proud of his role in discovering a new imaging approach to follow subcellular calcium signaling in filamentous fungi鈥攁 world first. His research today focuses on small microbes that cause disease in both humans and plants. And he is dedicated to his role at the Danforth Center, partnering with numerous colleagues to help advance their research as well.
 
In 2019, Kirk joined the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center as a principal investigator and director of the Advanced Bioimaging Laboratory Facility, to leverage advanced microscopy tools in plant science dedicated to producing more nutritious food and improving the environment. With over 30 years of advanced microscopy experience, Dr. Czymmek has expertise in most forms of light, X-ray, and electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, single-molecule imaging, superresolution microscopy, cryotechniques, and correlative microscopy. His work on developing and applying cutting-edge microscopy tools for imaging cells, tissues, and biomaterials has generated over 95 refereed publications.

Prior to joining the Danforth Center, Kirk served as Vice President of Global ZEISS Microscopy Customer Centers and oversight of eight customer centers and their teams worldwide. He joined the company in 2012 to build a world-class application, demonstration, and training center for the ZEISS microscopy portfolio for North America. From 2000 to 2012 he was an Associate Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Delaware (UD) where he worked to build an imaging capacity that led in 2001 to the creation of the UD Bio-Imaging Center at the Delaware Biotechnology Institute, where he served as Director.

Kirk received his doctorate in the Department of Botany and Plant Pathology at Michigan State University in 1993 followed by a post-doctoral position at the DuPont Company in CR&D Plant Molecular Genetics group. Subsequently, he worked with Noran Instruments in the confocal business group as an applications scientist before joining the University of Delaware.  He has received many awards and honors for his achievements in the field.

Dr. Foster is Senior Scientist and Distinguished Fellow, and also director of the Data Science and Learning Division, at Argonne National Laboratory, and the Arthur Holly Compton Distinguished Service Professor of Computer Science at the University of Chicago. His research deals with distributed, parallel, and data-intensive computing technologies, and innovative applications of those technologies to scientific problems in such domains as materials science, climate change, and biomedicine. He is a fellow of the AAAS, ACM, BCS, and IEEE, and an Office of Science Distinguished Scientists Fellow. His awards include the BCS Lovelace Medal and IEEE Babbage and Kanai awards.

Papatla can talk about the potential of using data science to analyze social media as another way to measure public opinion in an election campaign. Papatla is a professor of marketing at UW-Milwaukee and co-director of the Northwestern Mutual Data Science Institute. He helps to oversee the institute's Elecurator project, which uses a variety of data sources, including online and social media, traditional polling methods and political advertisements, to determine what issues are on the minds of voters. This big data look at voter behavior can help drive online strategies and outreach by candidates. Papatla also can speak about marketing and advertising trends, including why Instagram posts by consumers can affect how other consumers respond to brands, and how consumers engage with brands on social media platforms like Facebook.

Sona’s lab is interested in understanding how plants sense changes in their environment, like light, temperature, humidity and even microbes. As humans, we can sense that it is too cold outside and walk indoors where it is more comfortable. Plants don’t have that ability, so they have to modify what they are going to do within the environment. “The question my lab is asking is how are plants sensing a change in their surroundings and then what are some of the first changes that take place to respond?” To do this, Sona’s lab specifically looks at the proteins involved in sensing environmental changes, called G proteins. Her lab studies the signaling mechanisms of G proteins , and how that ultimately affects plant growth and development. As our environment changes and the population continues to grow, Sona’s work is becoming even more critical to feeding the world. In order to understand how a plant responds to changing environmental conditions like high temperatures, drought, or low nutrient availability, we need to know what is happening within the plant. Once we understand that, then we can improve the plants to be able to respond better to stress. In the future, this could mean that we may be able to grow crops in conditions that were previously uninhabitable. Not only could Sona’s research help plants respond to stress, it could also result in improved yield under normal conditions. “Our goal will always be to make plants survive better with lower inputs and under stressful conditions, while still maintaining or improving yield,” explains Sona.

Biologist Lauren Ponisio earned a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MS and BS from Stanford University. A National Geographic Society Early Career Award winner and honored as a Global Food Initiative 30 Under 30 in Food Systems, Ponisio earned a Moore/Sloan Data Science Postdoctoral Fellowship and National Institute for Food and Agriculture Fellowship. Ponisio joined the University of Oregon Department of Biology in 2020. She is also part of the Institute of Ecology and Evolution. Ponisio studies bees and their roles as pollinators, both in managed and natural-plant communities. She鈥檚 currently leading a pilot study that could change how forestlands in the Northwest are managed, particularly post-harvest and post-fire, to the benefit of wild bees. Her research has examined ways to persuade California almond growers to adopt more bee-friendly agricultural practices; discovered how native bee species may be best equipped to survive intensive agricultural practices and climate change; and analyzed how forest fires can help maintain pollinator biodiversity.

In addition to her research in biological sciences, her mission is to promote human diversity in the sciences.

Geneticist Bill Cresko studies the genomic basis of evolutionary change using comparative studies of natural populations in the wild and experimental approaches in the laboratory. He uses the threespine stickleback fish as his primary model to understand how molecular genetic variation can modify networks of genes and proteins to produce variation in evolutionarily important traits. Most recently, his lab has developed stickleback as a model for studies of how host genetic variation can influence their associated microbial communities. His lab is also well known for developing genomic tools (e.g. RAD-seq) and super-computing software (e.g. Stacks), both of which are now used by thousands of scientists around the world. Cresko鈥檚 group has published nearly 100 papers that have been cited thousands of times. In addition to several prestigious fellowships throughout his education from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), Cresko received the Fund for Faculty Excellence Award from the University in 2013 and was elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2016. 

Cresko holds numerous leadership roles on campus. He is associate vice president of research and leader of the Presidential Initiative in Data Science and a member of the Internal Advisory Board at the University for the Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact (KCASI). 

Work in his laboratory has been supported by grants from the NIH, NSF, the Murdock Charitable Trust and the W. M. Keck Foundation. Cresko co-founded the Applied Graduate Internship Program in Genomics and Bioinformatics, an interdisciplinary training program at UO, which is now part of KCASI. He has also provided key faculty leadership for over $600 million dollars in philanthropic donations to the University of Oregon over the last decade, primarily in support of research, including the largest single gift to a comprehensive public university from Phil and Penny Knight. 

Sarah Cooley鈥檚 research focuses on dynamic hydrologic change using satellite data. She is particularly interested in global water resources, Arctic surface hydrology and Arctic coastal change and its impact on communities. Her research uses new satellite technologies, including both NASA and commercial satellite data to study a wide range of topics including global water storage variability, shorefast sea ice breakup, Arctic lake area dynamics, and pan-Arctic river ice breakup. She has also participated in numerous field campaigns across Greenland, Northern Canada and Alaska. Her current research is funded by NASA Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Among her many accolades, Cooley was a Gates Cambridge Scholar and a NASA New Investigators Program in Earth Science Awardee. 

Cooley has a PhD in Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences from Brown University, an MPhil in Polar Studies from the University of Cambridge and a BS in geophysics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where she was a Morehead-Cain Scholar. She was a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Earth System Science at Stanford University as part of the inaugural cohort of Stanford Science Fellows.

Jim Samuel is an Associate Professor of Practice and Executive Director of the Informatics Program at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. He is an information and artificial intelligence (AI) scientist, with significant industry experience in finance, technology, entrepreneurship and data analytics. Dr. Samuel鈥檚 primary research covers human intelligence and artificial intelligences interaction and information philosophy. 

Dr. Samuel鈥檚 applied research focuses on the optimal use of big data and smart data driven AI applications, textual analytics, natural language processing and artificially intelligent public opinion informatics. His expertise extends to socioeconomic implications of AI, applied machine learning, social media analytics, AI education and AI bias.

Dr. Samuel completed his Ph.D. from the Zicklin School of Business, Baruch College 鈥� City University of New York, and he also has M.Arch and M.B.A (International Finance) degrees.  Dr. Samuel has worked with large multinational financial services corporations, and advises businesses and organizations on data analytics and AI driven value creation strategies. He is passionate about research driven thought leadership in AI, information philosophy, analytics and informatics. 

Dr. Tal Einav’s accomplishments included the development of sophisticated computational methods to understand viral behavior and predict how individuals react to vaccination or infection. This research earned Einav a prestigious Damon Runyon Quantitative Biology Fellowship and emphasized the importance of pursuing machine learning to analyze big data in immunology.
“We have these tremendous datasets that we’re just barely tapping into,” says Einav. These data allow Einav to understand the immune response in different contexts, from the young to the elderly, from healthy people to individuals who are immunocompromised. All with the goal to discover key patterns that let us understand and harness our immunity. Einav’s work has already demonstrated that blending biophysics and computer science enables researchers to predict the antibody response against new viral variants.
This work paves the way for a fundamentally new form of personalized medicine. For example, Einav imagines tailoring an individualized vaccine strain or dosage based on a patient’s specific antibody repertoire to create a stronger response that lasts for years, if not their entire life.

Dr.鈥疪atna Saripalli, PhD in artificial intelligence and machine learning, is the chief data officer of the . With over 20 years of technology leadership experience shipping enterprise data platforms and products, Saripalli leads EMSL's high-performance computing and data platform infrastructures. She works closely with platform and software engineers, data architects, computer scientists, and cybersecurity engineers to develop and deliver EMSL's overall digital infrastructure vision and strategy.  
As a technology leader and software engineer, she has industry experience in conceiving, implementing, and managing artificial intelligence, machine learning, data engineering, and analytics products and platforms. Before rejoining Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), she served as the vice president of technology at Berkeley Lights, in charge of developing computational methods for large datasets such as gene expression, metabolomics, and proteomics. Before that, she was a senior global director of data science at GE HealthCare for three years, developing world-class artificial intelligence products to revolutionize health care and improve clinical outcomes. She won the GE HealthCare Key Innovator award twice and has contributed to several patents and publications. She served at Microsoft for 11 years in various lead roles, helping ship Bing AdCenter, Office365, and Windows Data Science and Engineering products. Before joining Microsoft, she was a research scientist at PNNL for six years, contributing to global research projects pivotal to genomics and life sciences. 

Research Interests


Scalable, efficient deep reinforcement learning methods for health care and life sciences鈥� 
Artificial intelligence/machine learning model compression methods鈥� 
High-performance computing and distributed big data management platforms 


Education


MBA, University of California  
PhD in artificial intelligence and machine learning, Colorado State University 
MS in biomedical informatics, Stanford University


Patents


Michael D. Grafham, Kent D. Mitchell, Pei Li, and Venkata Ratnam Saripalli. Attribute Collection and Tenant Selection for Onboarding to a Workload. U.S. Patent US10387212B2, filed 15 June 2017, and issued 20 August 2019. . 
Venkata Ratna Saripalli, Gopal Avinash, Min Zhang, Ravi Soni, Jiahui Guan, Dibyajyoti PATI, and Zili Ma. Medical Machine Time-Series Event Data Processor. U.S. Patent US11404145B2, filed 27 November 2019, and issued 02 August 2022. . 


Publications

2021
Dong, X., T. Tan, M. Potter, Y.-C. Tsai, G. Kumar, and V. R. Saripalli. 2021. "To raise or not to raise: The autonomous learning rate question."鈥痑rXiv preprint arXiv:2106.08767. . 
Dong, X., M. Potter, G. Kumar, Y.-C. Tsai, and V. R. Saripalli. 2021. "Automating Augmentation Through Random Unidimensional Search."鈥痑rXiv preprint arXiv:2106.08756. . 
2020
Saripalli, V. R., D. Pati, M. Potter, G. Avinash, and C. W. Anderson. 2020. "Ai-assisted annotator using reinforcement learning."鈥疭.N. Computer Science鈥�1 (6): 1–8. . 
2019
Soni, R., J. Guan, G. Avinash, and V. R. Saripalli. 2019. "HMC: a hybrid reinforcement learning based model compression for healthcare applications." In鈥�2019 IEEE 15th International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE). Vancouver, BC, Canada, August 22–26, 2019. . 
Pati, D., C. Favart, P. Bahl, V. Soni, Y.-C. Tsai, M. Potter, J. Guan, X. Dong, and V. R. Saripalli. 2019. "Impact of Inference Accelerators on hardware selection."鈥痑rXiv preprint arXiv:1910.03060. . 
Dong, X., J. Hong, H.-M. Chang, M. Potter, A. Chowdhury, P. Bahl, V. Soni, Y.-C. Tsai, R. Tamada, G. Kumar, C. Favart, V. R. Saripalli, G. Avinash. 2019. "FastEstimator: A Deep Learning Library for Fast Prototyping and Productization."鈥痑rXiv preprint arXiv:1910.04875. . 

Hala Nelson is a professor of mathematics at James Madison University and the author of Essential Math for AI (O'Reilly 2023), and AI Powered Digital Twins (Wiley 2026). She specializes in mathematical modeling, AI and data strategy, digital twins, and consults for the Departments of Defense, State, and emergency and infrastructure services in the public sector. Nelson’s expertise lies at the intersection of mathematical modeling, data, AI, Digital Twins, real world industrial and military applications, and AI and data strategy and governance..
Nelson grew up in Lebanon during its brutal civil war. She lost her hair at a very young age in a missile explosion. This event, and many that followed, shaped her interests in human behavior, the nature of intelligence and artificial intelligence (AI). Her dad taught her math, at home and in French, until she graduated high school. Her favorite quote from her dad about math is, “It is the one clean science”.
Nelson earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics at Beirut Arab University, a master's degree in mathematics at American University of Beirut and a doctorate in mathematics at New York University.

Aivett Bilbao is a computational scientist in the . She conducts research on computational tools for mass spectrometry-based omics, working directly with experimental biologists and chemists in interdisciplinary teams. She has acquired extensive experience developing software for mass spectrometry using multiple programming languages and technologies. Projects include proteomics and and small molecule (e.g., metabolites and lipids) molecular characterization entailing both algorithm design and software implementation for data from different instruments (time-of-flight, quadrupole, and Fourier transform-based mass analyzers) and analytical separation techniques (liquid chromatography, ion mobility, solid phase extraction, and gas chromatography).
She earned her PhD from University of Geneva in Switzerland with special interest in data-independent acquisition mass spectrometry. Her bachelor’s degree is in computer engineering from Universidad de Oriente in Venezuela (cum laude) and her MSc studies were focused on machine learning algorithms and statistical methods at Telecom SudParis in France.

Mamello Thinyane is the Optus Chair of Cybersecurity and Data Science and an Associate Professor in the STEM unit at the University of South Australia.
Mamello is a computer science academic, cross-disciplinary researcher, and information technology professional with an interest in collective intelligence, societal cyber resilience, human-centric cybersecurity, and critical data studies. He has over 15 years experience working with governments, industry, academia, and civil society organizations on digital development projects in Africa and Asia. He previously served as the Senior Research Advisor and Principal Research Fellow at the United Nations University institute in Macau, a Director of the Telkom Centre of Excellence in ICT for Development and an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Fort Hare in South Africa, and a Visiting Researcher at the Australian Centre for Cyber Security at the University of New South Wales – Australian Defence Force Academy.
Mamello is passionate about the role of scientific research and technology innovation to advance sustainable good life for all.

Woodstock teaches applied mathematics courses, with an emphasis on how class material is used in everyday life. He specializes in optimization, and how it arises within machine learning tasks. 
His research focuses on two areas, developing new algorithms to solve modern challenges in data science and mathematically proving that these new algorithms are guaranteed to do their job. His work has been used for image reconstruction, audio de-noising and change detection from bitemporal satellite imagery.
 
 A goal of providing these mathematical guarantees is to contribute theoretically-sound alternatives to the theoretically unfounded ad-hoc techniques (e.g., neural network training with ReLU activation and algorithmic differentiation) that are rapidly being adopted in critical infrastructure. 
Woodstock earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics at JMU, a master's degree in applied mathematics at North Carolina State University and a doctorate in mathematics at North Carolina State University. Before joining JMU as faculty, he was a postdoctoral staff scientist at the Interactive Optimization and Learning Laboratory based in Technische Universität Berlin and the Zuse Institute Berlin.