National Academies Press: OpenBook
« Previous: References
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

Appendix A
Workshop Steering Group

Keith Yamamoto, Ph.D. (NAS/IOM), chair, is professor of cellular and molecular pharmacology and executive vice dean of the School of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He has been a member of the UCSF faculty since 1976, serving as director of the Program in Biomedical Science’s (PIBS) Graduate Program in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (1988-2003), vice chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics (1985-1994), chair of the Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology (1994-2003), and vice dean for research, School of Medicine (2002-2003). Dr. Yamamoto’s research is focused on signaling and transcriptional regulation by intracellular receptors, which mediate the actions of several classes of essential hormones and cellular signals; he uses both mechanistic and systems approaches to pursue these problems in pure molecules, cells, and whole organisms. Dr. Yamamoto was a founding editor of Molecular Biology of the Cell and serves on numerous editorial boards, scientific advisory boards, and national committees focused on public and scientific policy, public understanding and support of biological research, and science education; he has served on the Coalition for the Life Sciences (formerly the Joint Steering Committee for Public Policy) since 1996. For the National Academy of Sciences, he chairs the Board on Life Sciences. Dr. Yamamoto has long been involved in the process of peer review and the policies that govern it at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), serving as chair of the Molecular Biology Study Section, member of the NIH Director’s Working Group on the Division of Research Grants, chair of the Advisory Committee to the NIH Center

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

for Scientific Review (CSR), member of the NIH Director’s Peer Review Oversight Group, member of the CSR Panel on Scientific Boundaries for Review, member of the Advisory Committee to the NIH Director, co-chair of the Working Group to Enhance NIH Peer Review, and co-chair of the Review Committee for the Transformational R01 Award. Dr. Yamamoto was elected as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1988, the National Academy of Sciences in 1989, the Institute of Medicine in 2003, and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences in 2002.


Vicki L. Chandler, Ph.D. (NAS) is the chief program officer for science at the Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation in Palo Alto, California. She also maintains an active research program at the University of Arizona-Tucson, where she is a Regents’ Professor in the Departments of Plant Sciences and Molecular and Cellular Biology and a member of the BIO5 Institute. She holds the Carl E. and Patricia Weiler Endowed Chair for Excellence in Agriculture and Life Sciences. Dr. Chandler received her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, and her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Francisco. She has conducted pioneering research on the control of gene expression in plants and animals. She has received numerous honors and awards including a Presidential Young Investigator Award, Searle Scholar Award, the National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Award for Women Scientists and Engineers, and the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2002. She has served extensively on national advisory boards and panels for NSF, the Department of Energy (DOE), NIH, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). She served on the NSF Biological Directorate Advisory Committee from 2001to 2004 and served on the National Research Council (NRC) Committee on Defining and Advancing the Conceptual Basis of Biological Science. She has chaired or co-chaired national conferences for Keystone, the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), and the Gordon Research Conference (GRC), serving on the GRC board of trustees, and in 2001 as chair of the board. Dr. Chandler was elected to the International Society of Plant Molecular Biology Board of Directors 1999-2003 and elected president of the American Society of Plant Biologists for 2002. In 2007 she was elected to the Council of the National Academy of Sciences.


Christopher B. Field, Ph.D. (NAS) is the founding director of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology, professor of biological sciences at Stanford University, and faculty director of Stanford’s Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve. For most of the last two decades, Dr. Field has fostered the emergence of global ecology. His research emphasizes

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

ecological contributions across the range of earth science disciplines. Dr. Field and his colleagues have developed diverse approaches to quantifying large-scale ecosystem processes, using satellites, atmospheric data, models, and census data. They have explored local- and global-scale patterns of climate change impacts, vegetation-climate feedbacks, carbon cycle dynamics, primary production, forest management, and fire. At the ecosystem scale, Dr. Field has, for more than a decade, led major experiments on grassland responses to global change, experiments that integrate approaches from molecular biology to remote sensing. His activities in building the culture of global ecology include service on many national and international committees, including committees of the National Research Council, the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, and the Earth System Science Partnership. Dr. Field was a coordinating lead author for the fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He is a fellow of the Ecological Society of America’s Aldo Leopold Leadership Program and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. He has served on the editorial boards of Ecology, Ecological Applications, Ecosystems, Global Change Biology, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Dr. Field received his Ph.D. from Stanford in 1981 and has been at the Carnegie Institution since 1984. His recent priorities include high-performance “green” laboratories, integrity in the use of science by governments, local efforts to reduce carbon emissions, ecological impacts of biofuels, and the future of scientific publishing.


Jeffrey I. Gordon, M.D. (NAS/IOM), is the Dr. Robert J. Glaser Distinguished University Professor and Director of the Center for Genome Sciences at Washington University School of Medicine. He received his A.B. in biology from Oberlin College and his M.D. from the University of Chicago. Dr. Gordon joined the faculty of Washington University in 1981, after completing his clinical training in internal medicine and gastroenterology. He has remained at Washington University for his entire professional career. From 1991 to 2004, he was head of the Department of Molecular Biology and Pharmacology. In 2004 he resigned as department head to become the first director of the newly founded Center for Genome Sciences. This new center represents an interdepartmental, interdisciplinary, and multigenerational intentional community of faculty, postdocs, and students who are geneticists, population biologists and biostatisticians, computational biologists and computer scientists, systems biologists and engineers, and microbiologists and ecologists. The focus of the center is on comparative genomics and biodiversity, plus systems biology (an emerging area that seeks to describe how complex networks of interacting genes, proteins, and metabolites function to maintain normal cells

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

and how these networks adapt to perturbations, including those brought about by various disease states). Dr. Gordon’s lab studies the genomic and metabolic foundations of mutually beneficial host-microbial relationships in the human gut with an emphasis on the interrelationships between the gut microbiome, diet, and nutritional status. He has published more than 400 scientific papers and is named as inventor or co-inventor on 23 U.S. patents. He has received a number of honors in recognition of his scientific contributions, including election to the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.


Pedro A. Sanchez, Ph.D., is director of tropical agriculture and senior research scholar at the Earth Institute of Columbia University in New York City. He serves as co-chair of the Hunger Task Force of the Millennium Project, an advisory body to the United Nations. Sanchez served as director general of the World Agroforestry Center (ICRAF) headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, from 1991 to 2001. He is also professor emeritus of soil science and forestry at North Carolina State University and was a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He was named a MacArthur Foundation fellow in 2003 and received the World Food Prize in 2002. His professional career has been dedicated to improving the management of tropical soils through integrated natural resource management approaches to achieve food security and reduce rural poverty while protecting and enhancing the environment. Sanchez is author of Properties and Management of Soils of the Tropics (John Wiley and Sons 1976; rated among the top 10 best-selling books in soil science worldwide), and author of more than 200 scientific publications. He is a fellow of the American Society of Agronomy and the Soil Science Society of America. He has received decorations from the governments of Colombia and Peru and was awarded the International Soil Science Award and the International Service in Agronomy Award. In 2001, the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, awarded him a doctor honoris causa degree for his work on tropical soils in Africa and he was anointed as elder by the Luo community of Western Kenya, in recognition for his assistance in eliminating hunger from many villages in the region. A native of Cuba, he received his Ph.D. degree from Cornell University.


Christopher R. Somerville, Ph.D. (NAS), is the director of the Energy BioSciences Institute in Berkeley, California. He oversees all activities at the institute, including research, communication, education, and outreach. He also chairs the institute’s Executive Committee. Dr. Somerville is a professor in the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology at the University of California, Berkeley, and a visiting scientist at the Lawrence

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

Berkeley National Laboratory. His research focuses on the characterization of proteins implicated in plant cell-wall synthesis and modification. He has published more than 200 scientific papers in plant and microbial genetics, genomics, biochemistry, and biotechnology. Dr. Somerville has served on the scientific advisory boards of many corporations, academic institutions, and private foundations in Europe and North America. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of London, and the Royal Society of Canada.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×

This page intentionally left blank.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 29
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 30
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 31
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 32
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 33
Suggested Citation:"Appendix A: Workshop Steering Group." National Research Council. 2010. Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/13018.
×
Page 34
Next: Appendix B: Workshop Background »
Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment: Summary of a Workshop, June 3-4, 2010 Get This Book
×
Buy Paperback | $29.00 Buy Ebook | $23.99
MyNAP members save 10% online.
Login or Register to save!
Download Free PDF

As the second decade of the 21st century begins, the challenge of how to feed a growing world population and provide sustainable, affordable energy to fulfill daily needs, while also improving human health and protecting the environment, is clear and urgent. Increasing demand for food and energy is projected at the same time as the supply of land and other resources decrease. Increasing levels of greenhouse gasses alter climate, which, in turn, has life-changing implications for a broad range of plant and animal species.

But promising developments are on the horizon--scientific discoveries and technologies that have the potential to contribute practical solutions to these seemingly intractable problems. As described in the 2009 National Research Council book, A New Biology for the 21st Century, biological research has experienced extraordinary scientific and technological advances in recent years that have allowed biologists to collect and make sense of ever more detailed observations at ever smaller time intervals. With these advances have come increasingly fruitful collaborations of biologists with scientists and engineers from other disciplines.

A New Biology for the 21st Century called for a series of workshops to provide concrete examples of what New Biology research programs could look like. The present volume summarizes the first of those workshops, Implementing the New Biology: Decadal Challenges Linking Food, Energy, and the Environment.

  1. ×

    Welcome to OpenBook!

    You're looking at OpenBook, NAP.edu's online reading room since 1999. Based on feedback from you, our users, we've made some improvements that make it easier than ever to read thousands of publications on our website.

    Do you want to take a quick tour of the OpenBook's features?

    No Thanks Take a Tour »
  2. ×

    Show this book's table of contents, where you can jump to any chapter by name.

    « Back Next »
  3. ×

    ...or use these buttons to go back to the previous chapter or skip to the next one.

    « Back Next »
  4. ×

    Jump up to the previous page or down to the next one. Also, you can type in a page number and press Enter to go directly to that page in the book.

    « Back Next »
  5. ×

    Switch between the Original Pages, where you can read the report as it appeared in print, and Text Pages for the web version, where you can highlight and search the text.

    « Back Next »
  6. ×

    To search the entire text of this book, type in your search term here and press Enter.

    « Back Next »
  7. ×

    Share a link to this book page on your preferred social network or via email.

    « Back Next »
  8. ×

    View our suggested citation for this chapter.

    « Back Next »
  9. ×

    Ready to take your reading offline? Click here to buy this book in print or download it as a free PDF, if available.

    « Back Next »
Stay Connected!