Mark Moffett, tropical explorer and biologist, is traveling with globe with the support of the John Templeton Foundation to investigate the life and death of societies across the animal world and in humans right up to the present day.
Melissa Wells is an expert at managing healthcare systems in the US and abroad. When on expeditions with fellow explorer Moffett, she also captures the work and inspiration of scientific researchers through photography and film.
Laurie Anderson is one of America’s most daring creative pioneers. Renowned for her multimedia presentations, she is a visual artist, vocalist, songwriter, and director whose groundbreaking works span the worlds of art, theater, and music.
Roy Baumeister is among the most prolific, frequently cited psychologists in the world, with over 600 articles and 35 books, including New York Times bestseller Willpower. Roy works on issues such as identity, meaning, self-esteem, and free will.
With his brother Joel, Ethan Coen has written, produced, and directed such films as the Academy Award-winning No Country for Old Men and Fargo. Now in the 35th year of their career, their 18th feature film, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, is currently in release.
Psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Norman Doidge’s books, The Brain That Changes Itself and The Brain’s Way of Healing, have been called “remarkable” by Oliver Sacks and “brilliant” by the London Times. He is also highly regarded as a poet.
Sheldon Glashow is a theoretical physicist focused on particle physics and cosmology: the sciences at the far extremes of size. He discovered the fundamental particle “Charm” and has a Nobel Prize for contributions to the unified theory.
Bernd Heinrich, naturalist, artist, and outdoorsman, has made major contributions to ecology, with highly praised books on everything from long-distance running and the economics of living in a bumblebee hive to the intelligence of ravens.
One of the most accomplished scholars regarding human origins, Donald Johanson has produced some of the field’s most groundbreaking discoveries, including the most widely known fossil of the 20th century, the 3.2-million-year-old “Lucy” skeleton.
Peter Norvig was the senior computer scientist at NASA before becoming director of research at Google. He coauthored the most important textbook on artificial intelligence, and millions have read his article on learning to program in ten years.
Pete Souza was the official White House photographer under President Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama and former director of the White House Photography Office. Pete’s most recent bestseller is Shade: A Tale of Two Presidents.
Amy Tan, a New York Times best-selling novelist and writer of children’s books and memoirs, also co-wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation of her book, The Joy Luck Club, and the libretto for the opera The Bonesetter’s Daughter.
Jill Tarter, Emeritus Chair of SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) received the TED Prize and has been named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. She is portrayed by Jodie Foster in the movie Contact.