Jack Abramoff is a former Republican "superlobbyist,” businessman and movie producer. In January 2006, Abramoff was sentenced to six years in federal prison for mail fraud, conspiracy to bribe public officials, and tax evasion. After serving four years in prison, he was released, and wrote the book Capitol Punishment: The Hard Truth About Corruption From America's Most Notorious Lobbyist which was published in November 2011. Abramoff's lobbying scandals are the subject of two 2010 films: the documentary Casino Jack and the United States of Money, released in May 2010, and the feature film Casino Jack, released on December 17, 2010, starring Kevin Spacey as Abramoff.

Cynthia Breazeal is an Associate Professor of Media Arts andSciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where she founded anddirects the Personal Robots Group at the Media Lab. She is a pioneer of socialrobotics and Human Robot Interaction. Dr. Breazeal is a recipient of theNational Academy of Engineering's Gilbreth Lecture Award, Technology Review'sTR35 Award, and TIME magazine's Best Inventions of 2008.

Nicholas A. Christakis, MD, PhD, MPH, directs the Human Nature Lab at Harvard University. He is Professor of Medical Sociology in the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School; Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine at Harvard Medical School; and Professor of Sociology in the Department of Sociology in the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Christakis' lab is currently focused on the relationship between social networks and health. People are inter-connected, and so their health is inter-connected. This research engages two types of phenomena: the social, mathematical, and biological rules governing how social networks form ("connection") and the biological and social implications of how they operate to influence thoughts, feelings, and behaviors ("contagion"). Other ongoing investigations in the lab consider the biodemographic determinants of longevity and the genetic bases for human behaviors.

P.J. Crowley is a former Assistant Secretary and Spokesman for the Department of State. He resigned on March 13, 2011, following comments he made about the treatment of Bradley Manning. In his resignation letter, Crowley stood by his public pronouncement that the Defense Department's treatment of Manning was "ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid." Crowley wrote that while the "unauthorized disclosure of classified information is a serious crime under U.S. law", the "exercise of power in today's challenging times and relentless media environment must be prudent and consistent with our laws and values". Crowley was named the 2011-2012 recipient of the General Omar N. Bradley Chair in Strategic Leadership, a joint initiative among the United States Army War College, Dickinson College and the The Pennsylvania State University – Dickinson School of Law.

Desh Deshpande is the President of Sparta Group LLC, a family investment office. Desh is also the Chairman of A123 Systems (AONE), Sycamore Networks (SCMR), Tejas Networks and HiveFire. Desh co-founded Sycamore Networks in 1998.  Prior to that Dr. Deshpande was founder and chairman of Cascade Communications Corp. Dr. Deshpande serves as a life-member of the MIT Corporation, and his generous donations have made possible MIT's Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation. Leveraging the experience gained at the MIT Center, Deshpande Foundation has set up three other centers;  Deshpande Center for Social Entrepreneurship in India, Merrimack Valley Social Entrepreneurship Sandbox in Lowell/Lawrence Massachusetts and Pond-Deshpande Center at the University of New Brunswick in Canada.

Skip Gates is a literary critic, scholar and writer.  In April of 2010 he wrote a controversial editorial called “Ending the Slavery Blame-Game” in the NY Times analyzing the role of Africans in the slave trade and the complications surrounding reparations to the families of slaves.  This article sparked much debate in the media and was publicly criticized by some academics and activists.  Gates has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show, has been listed among Time Magazine’s 25 Most Influential Americans, sits on the boards of many notable institutions including the Aspen Institute and New York Public Library, and in 2010 became the first African American to have his genome fully sequenced for a PBS collaboration project called ‘Faces of America”.

David Gergen is the Editor-at-large for U.S. News and World Report and the Senior Political Analyst for CNN. Gergen is a former presidential advisor who served during the administrations of Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Clinton. He is currently Director of the Center for Public Leadership and a professor of public service at Harvard Kennedy School.

Daniel Gilbert is a professor of Psychology known as Professor Happiness. Gilbert teaches at Harvard University where he has won numerous awards for his teaching and research. Gilbert is the author of the international bestseller Stumbling on Happiness, which has been translated into more than 25 languages and which won the 2007 Royal Society Prizes for Science Books.

Tom Glocer is the former Chief Executive Officer of Thomson Reuters, the world's leading source of intelligent information for businesses and professionals. Glocer is a director of Merck & Co., Inc. and the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a member of the International Business Council of the World Economic Forum, the International Advisory Board of British American Business Inc., the Columbia College Board of Visitors, the President’s Council on International Activities at Yale University, the Advisory Board of the Judge Institute of Management at Cambridge University, the European Business Leaders Council, the Corporate Advisory Board of Tate Britain and the Madison Council of the Library of Congress.

Kenneth Mehlman is the former campaign manager for the 2004 re-election campaign of George W. Bush and Chairman of the Republican National Committee from 2005 to 2007. Mehlman is also one of the most prominent openly gay figures in the Republican Party. Mehlman is currently a member and Head of Global Public Affairs for Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.

Dr. Douglas Melton is a leading biologist in cellular research. His groundbreaking work, which focuses on the the developmental biology of the pancreas, aims to provide diabetics with insulin-producing beta-cells. Dr. Melton is a founding member of the International Society for Stem Cell Research. He has been spearheading a collaboration between the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Harvard University, and the Boston In Vitro Fertilization clinic to develop human embryonic stem lines for research purposes. In addition to serving as the Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences at Harvard University, Dr. Melton works as the co-director of Harvard’s Stem Cell Institute and as a lead investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Carolyn Porco is a planetary scientist who leads the imagingscience team on the Cassini mission currently in orbit around Saturn. In 2008,Porco was named by Wired magazine as one of "15 People the Next PresidentShould Listen To." In 2009, New Statesman named Porco one of "The 50 People WhoMatter Today." In 2010 Porco was awarded the Carl Sagan Medal, presented by theAmerican Astronomical Society for Excellence in the Communication of Science tothe Public.

Laurie Santos is the director of the Comparative Cognition Laboratory at Yale University, which explores the evolutionary origins of the human mind by comparing the cognitive abilities of human and non-human primates. Her research examines the following broad questions: what domains of knowledge are unique to the human mind? Given that human infants and non-human primates both lack language, what similarities and differences do we see in the expression of non-linguistic domains of knowledge?

As a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, Thiel has been involved with some of the most dynamic companies to emerge from Silicon Valley in the past decade. Thiel's first start-up was PayPal, which he co-founded in 1998, and led as Chairman and CEO. After eBay acquired PayPal for $1.5 billion in 2002, Thiel founded Clarium Capital Management, a global macro hedge fund. As a venture capitalist in his personal capacity, Thiel funded companies like Facebook, where he was that company's first outside investor and director. Thiel's contributions to technology, entrepreneurship, and finance have been widely recognized, including by the World Economic Forum, which honored Thiel as a Young Global Leader, and by BusinessWeek, which named him one of the 25 most influential people on the Web.

Peter Salovey is Provost and the Chris Argyris Professor of Psychology at Yale University. As Provost, he facilitates strategic planning, long-term decision making, and the allocation of resources in order to promote academic excellence in all parts of the University. In addition, he oversees design and implementation of policies affecting faculty and students throughout the University. Salovey is the author of 13 books.

Lawrence H. Summers is the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University. He served as 27th president of Harvard University from July 2001 until June 2006. An eminent scholar and admired public servant, Mr. Summers has taught on the faculty at Harvard and MIT. He has served in a series of senior public policy positions, including Political Economist for the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, chief economist of the World Bank, and Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. In 1993 he received the John Bates Clark Medal, given every two years to the outstanding American economist under the age of 40. Mr. Summers received his B.S. from MIT and his PhD in economics from Harvard.

Vivek Wadhwa is Vice President of Academics and Innovation at Singularity University, which educates a select group of leaders about the exponentially growing technologies that are soon going to change our world. These advances—in fields such as robotics, A.I., computing, synthetic biology, 3D printing, medicine, and nanomaterials—are making it possible for small teams to do what was once possible only for governments and large corporations to do: solve the grand challenges in education, water, food, shelter, health, and security. In his roles at Stanford, Duke, and Emory universities, Wadhwa lectures on entrepreneurship and public policy and leads groundbreaking research projects. Prior to joining academia in 2005, Wadhwa founded two software companies.

Elizabeth Warren is a Democratic candidate in the 2012 United States Senate election in Massachusetts. She chaired the Congressional Oversight Panel for the 2008 U.S. Troubled Asset Relief Program. She also led the conception and establishment of the United States Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Warren was twice named one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World by Time magazine.

John Wood is the founder and board co-chair of Room to Read, a global nonprofit organization focused on literacy and gender equality in education in Asia and Africa that has reached over 6 million children. Wood described his experience of founding Room to Read in his book Leaving Microsoft to Change the World: An Entrepreneur's Odyssey to Educate the World's Children. He is a member of the Clinton Global Initiative's Advisory Board and is a frequent lecturer at Harvard's Graduate School of Education and NYU's Stern School of Business.

Stephen Wolfram is a distinguished scientist, inventor, author, and business leader. He is the creator of Mathematica, the author of A New Kind of Science, the creator of Wolfram|Alpha, and the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research. Wolfram has a lifelong commitment to research and education. In addition to providing software for a generation of scientists and students, Wolfram's company maintains some of the web's most visited sites for technical information. Wolfram is also increasingly active in defining new directions for education, especially in the science he has created.

Rebecca Costa is a socio-biologist who offers a genetic explanation for current events, emerging trends and individual behavior. Costa’s book The Watchman’s Rattle: Thinking Our Way Out of Extinction examines how the principles governing evolution cause and provide a solution for global gridlock. Costa offers her unique view of our current inaction on issues such as government debt, the environment and education, and prescribes a solution for the way out.

Ed Crane is the founder and President of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. The Washington Post’s Ezra Klein recently wrote, “The Cato Institute is Washington’s leading advocate for smaller government.” Crane is also a Chartered Financial Analyst and former Vice President of Alliance Capital Management Corp. He serves on the boards of the Center for Competitive Politics, U. S. Term Limits, and Americans for Limited Government. In addition, he is a member of the Mont Pelerin Society.

Stephen DeBerry is a pioneer in structuring and managing investments that align strong financial returns with positive social impact. He is the founder of Bronze Investments and a partner at Kapor Capital. Stephen previously held the role of Investment Director at Omidyar Network, the mission-based investment firm started by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife, Pam and managed business development at Interval Research, the research lab established by Microsoft co-founder, Paul Allen. In addition to his investment activity he is an active leader on several nonprofit boards ranging from Friends of New Orleans to The Dalai Lama Foundation.

Peter Diamandis is the Chairman and CEO of the X PRIZE Foundation (www.xprize.org), which leads the world in designing and launching large incentive prizes to drive radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity. Best known for the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE for private spaceflight and the $10 million Progressive Automotive X PRIZE for 100 mile-per-gallon equivalent cars, the Foundation is now launching prizes in Exploration, Life Sciences, Energy, and Education. Diamandis is considered an expert regarding the future of business and specifically how to change our next “big ideas” into reality.

Rahm Emanuel was elected the 46th Mayor of Chicago on February 22nd, 2011.

Mayor Emanuel ran on a pledge to strengthen Chicago’s schools, improve the safety of its streets, and stabilize the City’s finances. In his first week in office, Mayor Emanuel signed Executive Orders strengthening ethics rules for City employees, laid out a plan to realize $75 million in savings from the 2011 fiscal year budget, launched a panel tasked with making the city’s community investment program more transparent and accountable, and redeployed 500 police officers to the neighborhoods.

Previously, Mayor Emanuel served as the White House Chief of Staff in the administration of President Barack Obama, where he helped orchestrate the passage of key legislation including the economic Recovery Act, Wall Street reform, and health care reform – increasing access and decreasing costs for millions of Americans.Prior to working in the administration, Mayor Emanuel served three terms in the House of Representatives representing Chicago’s 5th District, serving on the House Ways and Means Committee and subcommittees on Health and Select Revenue.

Before becoming a member of Congress, Mayor Emanuel served in the Clinton White House where he helped pass the COPS initiative, which added 100,000 police officers to neighborhoods around the country. He began his career at Illinois Public Action, the state’s largest public interest organization.

Emanuel graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1981 and received a Master’s Degree in Speech and Communication from Northwestern University in 1985.

Deborah Fallows is the author of Dreaming In Chinese: Mandarin Lessons in Life, Love, and Language, a book about the three years she and her husband spent living in China. Fallows, who has a Ph.D. in linguistics, found that studying Mandarin offered her an invaluable perspective on the Chinese culture. Of her time in China she says, “The lens of the language became my way to understand and explain many of the confounding things that I was seeing every day.” Her previous book is A Mother’s Work and has written for the New York Times Book Review, National Geographic, The Atlantic, and numerous other publications.

James Fallows is a print and radio journalist and a national correspondent for The Atlantic and has been reporting from abroad since the late 1970’s. He writes primarily about politics, technology, and economic trends as they relate to the US, the Middle East, Asia, and the rest of the world. He has written nine books, including National Defense, which won the American Book Award in nonfiction. He has also won the National Magazine Award for “The Fifty-First State”, an article predicting the consequences of invading Iraq. He is a regular commentator on NPR’s All Things Considered and has a blog at www.jamesfallows.theatlantic.com.

Adam Glick is president of the real estate development firm The Jack Parker Corporation, a managing director at the hedge fund Tesuji Partners LLC, and President and co-founder of The Floating University. Mr. Glick is also the author of A Child’s Guide to Money, a composer, and a playwright. He formerly sat on the boards of The Dalton School, The 92nd St. Y, and The Hebrew Free Loan Society. Mr. Glick received his B.A. from Yale University in 1982.

Mellody Hobson is the president of Ariel Investments, LLC, a Chicago investment firm managing over $3 billion in assets and is one of the largest African American-owned money management and mutual fund companies in the United States. Hobson regularly contributes to ABC’s Good Morning America on financial issues and has been named as one of The Wall Street Journal’s “50 Women to Watch”. In addition, Hobson sits on the board of directors for several major companies such as Starbucks, Estée Lauder, and DreamWorks Animation.

Mark Hyman MD has dedicated his career to identifying and addressing the root causes of chronic illness through a groundbreaking whole-systems medicine approach known as Functional Medicine. He is a family physician, a four-time New York Times best-selling author, and an internationally recognized leader in his field. Dr. Hyman is Chairman of the Institute for Functional Medicine, and was awarded its 2009 Linus Pauling Award for Leadership in Functional Medicine.

Ankur Jain is a philanthropist and entrepreneur, with a focus on leveraging innovation and entrepreneurship as a means to solve global problems.

Jain is the founder and chairman of the Kairos Society, an organization of young entrepreneurs working to create billion-dollar solutions to the world challenges. Jain is also the co-founder and CEO of Panjia Co., which helps early stage technology companies in foreign markets accelerate growth into the United States, China, and Middle East. Jain has said that he believes helping entrepreneurs work across national borders can serve as a means to “privatize diplomacy.”

In 2010, Jain was selected as one of 80 students (out of 1,800) to participate in the Singularity University Summer Program, an interdisciplinary program based at the NASA Ames campus in Silicon Valley. He has been recognized as a Leader of the Future at theAmbrosetti Forum and as a Young Global Leader at the World Foresight Forum and the St. Petersberg International Economic Forum. In 2011, Inc. magazine named Ankur Jain the “Best Connected 21-Year-Old in the World” and awarded Jain “30 Under 30”.

Jain graduated from the Wharton School of Business in May, 2011.

Dean Kamen is an entrepreneur and inventor best known for creating the Segway PT, an electric, self-balancing human transporter. Kamen founded FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), a program for students to get people interested in science, technology, and engineering. One of FIRST’s initial robotic programs created a Lego League where students compete to create the most innovative advancement using Legos. Kamen was named “One of the world’s most prominent and prolific inventors” when he received the prestigious Stevens Honor Award in 2009, given by the Stevens Institute of Technology and the Stevens Alumni Association.

Sarah Kay is an up-and-coming artist who has worked as a performance poet since age 14. In 2004, Sarah founded Project V.O.I.C.E. and has since taught Spoken Word Poetry to students of all ages in classrooms and workshops all over the world. Most recently, Sarah was a featured speaker at the 2011 TED conference in Long Beach, California.

Edward “Eddie” Lampert is a renowned hedge fund manager, the founder of ESL Investments, Inc., a private investment company, and the Chairman of Sears Holdings Corporation. As of March 31, 2011, funds run by Eddie Lampert at ESL Investments were valued at $10.69 billion. Lampert has recently been called “the next Warren Buffet.”

Jim Lasko is an internationally-celebrated artist that is concerned with public space. He uses his formal training as a theater maker to create public events designed to facilitate cultural participation. These events appear as spectacles, parades and site specific performances, interactive exhibits, and also as traditional theater productions.

Mr. Lasko has served as Artistic Director of Redmoon for 20 years. He was named the City of Chicago's first ever Artist-in-Residence, an acknowledgement of his long commitment and ground-breaking success in this art form.

Richard Marcinko, aka, “Rogue Warrior” is a former Navy SEAL and was the first commanding officer of SEAL Team 6, an elite counter-terrorist unit. Marcinko also formed the elite unit Red Cell, which tested the security of naval bases, nuclear submarines, airports and a U.S. embassy. After leaving the Navy, Marcinko published The New York Times best-selling autobiography Rogue Warrior.

William McDonough is a designer, thought leader, and co-creator, with Michael Braungart, of the “Cradle to Cradle” approach to design. He advises top leaders in all sectors including venture capital, government policy, city and building design, product manufacturing, industrial systems, economic systems and new business models, energy and water systems, and material re-utilization in biological or technical cycles. In 1996, he became the only individual to receive the Presidential Award for Sustainable Development. In 2003, he re-ceived the Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award. In 2004, he received the U.S. National Design Award. He was named a “Hero of the Planet” by Time magazine with a citation that included this assessment: “His utopianism is grounded in a unified philosophy that—in demonstrable and practical ways—is changing the design of the world.”

Casey Neistat is a filmmaker based in New York City. His 2010 self-titled television show called The Neistat Brothers, debuted on HBO. The series of eight episodes is made up of short stories about the lives of Casey and his brother, Van. The series, like much of his work, was produced, written, filmed and edited by Neistat himself. In 2003 his short film, iPod’s Dirty Secret, became nationally recognized for its criticism on Apple’s battery replacement program for the iPod and forced Apple to effectively change their policy. In 2011, he released a short film critical of NYC cycling laws, which also received national attention and forced a dialogue regarding such laws that was ultimately addressed by Mayor Bloomberg.

Elisa "Lisa" New is Professor of English at Harvard University. Her areas of study include American poetry, 19th century American literature, religious literature, and Jewish literature. Her books include The Line's Eye: Poetic Experience, American Sight (1999), The Regenerate Lyric: Theology and Innovation in American Poetry (1993) and Jacob's Cane: A Jewish Family's Journey from the Four lands of Lithuania to the Ports of Baltimore and London (2009).

Jay Parkinson MD was dubbed “Doctor of the Future” by Fast Company and one of the top 10 most creative people in health care. Parkinson is the founder of his healthcare delivery breakthrough Hello Health, which utilizes secure social networks and electronic medical records to enable doctors and patients to connect via email, IM, and video chat. He has also started his own design firm called The Future Well, where he designs and builds products and services that inspire health and happiness.

Kenneth Roman is the former Chairman and CEO of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, the international advertising and communications agency. After 26 years with the firm, he joined American Express in a senior communications role before becoming a consultant, board director and author. His most recent book is The King of Madison Avenue: David Ogilvy and the Making of Modern Advertising where he analyzes the art of rethinking business as usual.

Deb Roy studies how children learn language, and designs machines that communicate in human-like ways. Roy has applied his research at the MIT Media Lab to Bluefin Labs, a technology company he co-founded. With Bluefin Labs, Roy has created a platform that analyzes social media commentary and measures real-time audience response to TV ads and shows. Roy’s work was recently featured at the TED 2011 conference in his popular talk The Birth of a Word.

Eric Schmidt is the Executive Chairman for Google (formerly CEO from 2001–2011). Prior to joining Google, Eric served on the board of directors for Apple Inc., the board of trustees for both Carnegie Mellon and Princeton Universities, was the chairman and CEO of Novell, Chief Technology Officer at Sun Microsystems, and served on the research staff at Xerox PARC, Bell Labs and Zilog. In 2005, Eric and his wife, Wendy, created The Schmidt Family Foundation, which focuses on the responsible use of energy and natural resources. The Foundation has launched several projects on Nantucket, including ReMain Nantucket, a program that seeks to build on the island’s unique history of conservation, independence and innovation.

Tom Stewart is Chief Marketing and Knowledge Officer for global management consulting firm Booz & Company. Before joining Booz & Company, Stewart was the editor and managing director of Harvard Business Review. Additionally, Stewart was Editorial Director for Business 2.0 and served as a member of Fortune’s Board of Editors. He is also the author of Intellectual Capital: The New Wealth of Organizations, and The Wealth of Knowledge: Intellectual Capital and the 21st Century Organization.

Lawrence H. Summers is the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University. He served as 27th president of Harvard University from July 2001 until June 2006. An eminent scholar and admired public servant, Mr. Summers has taught on the faculty at Harvard and MIT. He has served in a series of senior public policy positions, including Political Economist for the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, chief economist of the World Bank, and Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. In 1993 he received the John Bates Clark Medal, given every two years to the outstanding American economist under the age of 40. Mr. Summers received his B.S. from MIT and his PhD in economics from Harvard.

In 1998, Julie Taymor became the first woman to win the Tony® Award for Best Direction of a Musical, and also won a Tony® for Best Costumes, for her landmark production of The Lion King. The musical has won three Molière Awards including Best Musical and Best Costumes, garnered Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Drama League awards for Taymor’s direction, and myriad awards for her original costume, mask and puppet designs. For her latest Broadway production, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Taymor served as director and co-book writer. Taymor made her Broadway debut in 1996 with Juan Darién: A Carnival Mass, nominated for five Tony® Awards. Other theatre work includes The Green Bird, Titus Andronicus, The Tempest, The Taming of the Shrew, The Transposed Heads and Liberty’s Taken. Taymor’s feature film directorial debut, Titus, starred Anthony Hopkins, Jessica Lange and Alan Cumming. In 2002, her biographical film Frida, starring Salma Hayek and Alfred Molina, earned six Academy Award® nominations, winning two. She took on the music of The Beatles, and earned a Golden Globe® nomination for BestMotion Picture - Musical or Comedy, in Across the Universe. Julie’s most recent film, The Tempest, had its North American premiere at the 48th New York Film Festival in October 2010, following a world premiere at the 67th Venice International Film Festival. Taymor’s adaptation of the William Shakespeare play features an all-star cast including Helen Mirren, Russell Brand, Djimon Hounsou and Alfred Molina. Beyond the theatre and screen, Taymor has directed five operas internationally including Oedipus Rex with Jessye Norman, for which she earned the International Classical Music Award for Best Opera Production. A subsequent film version premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and won her an Emmy® award. Taymor also directed Salome ́, The Flying Dutchman, Die Zauberflöte (which has been in repertory at The Met for six years), The Magic Flute (the abridged English version of Die Zauberflöte, which inaugurated a new PBS series entitled “Great Performances at The Met”) and Elliot Goldenthal’s Grendel. Taymor is a 1991 recipient of the MacArthur “genius” Fellowship.

Krista Tippett is a Peabody award-winning broadcaster, journalist and author. She created and hosts On Being, a podcast and public radio program about religion, spirituality, ethics, and meaning in diverse aspects of 21st Century life (http://onbeing.org/about/). She is author of the New York Times bestselling, Einstein’s God – Conversations about Science and the Human Spirit.

Craig Venter is a biologist and entrepreneur and best known for being among the first to sequence the human genome. Venter founded Celera Genomics, The Institute for Genomic Research and the J. Craig Venter Institute, and has been listed twice as one of Time magazine’s “Most Influential People In The World”. He has won countless awards for his scientific work, authored over 200 publications, and been a guest on several programs including the Colbert Report. Simply, Venter is the leading authority on the future of genetics.

Bob Wright is the former Chairman of NBC Universal and had one of the longest and most successful tenures of any media company chief executive. He is also the co-founder of Autism Speaks, the largest organization representing families and people with autism in the U.S. Wright’s effectiveness is attributed to his ability to bring his business and management skills to charity, and numerous other institutions, including government agencies and insurance companies.