When we hold our annual two-day ideas and innovations festival WIRED2015 on October 15-16 in London, some of the strongest talks will be from the WIRED Innovation Fellows -- 12 emerging stars we've brought together from fields as diverse as music and gastronomy to engineering.
The 12 recipients of last year's inaugural WIRED Innovation Fellowships have continued to inspire, innovate and influence, and we've helped support and nurture their vision along the way -- giving them free access to all WIRED events, coverage in our publications and support and mentorship.
We expect this year's Innovation Fellows to be just as strong. Here's a rundown of the chosen 12 in full:
Ryan Weed
Co-founder and CEO, Positron Dynamics
- Weed is developing the world's first antimatter rocket.
Ryan Weed, a USAF pilot and physicist, co-founder and CEO of Positron Dynamics, is developing the world’s first antimatter rocket. In a former nuclear fallout shelter a few blocks away from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, Ryan’s company is harnessing the incredible energy density of positrons (anti-electrons) to produce a propulsion unit 1,000-times more efficient than state of the art Ion-thrusters; an engine that will allow spacecraft to travel faster and farther thanever before, making it possible for humans to become a truly interstellar species.
Comedian and writer, Wolf T productions
- Keen creates pioneering science/comedy shows and her new series explores how technology can solve the world's problems
Helen Keen Helen Keen is a comedian and writer who creates pioneering live science-comedy shows and innovative and award-winning radio programmes. It Is Rocket Science, her space science stand-up show, has so far launched three popular and critically acclaimed series on BBC Radio 4, winning the 2013 Women In Science and Engineering (WISE) Media Award, and a nomination for the 2014 Writers’ Guild Award for Best Radio Comedy. Her latest series Big Problems with Helen Keen begins in June 2015 on BBC Radio 4, and explores whether it will be possible to use technology to solve the world’s problems.
Freeman Osonuga
Humanitarian and medical doctor, Health Corps, African Union Support For Ebola Outbreak in West Africa (ASEOWA)
- Osonuga worked in Sierra Leone for six months on the front-line against the ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone.
Freeman Osonuga is a medical doctor who was deployed by the Nigerian government and seconded to the African Union Support For Ebola Outbreak in West Africa (ASEOWA). He worked in Sierra Leone for 6 months as part of African Union's Ebola Response Team. Freeman is an Associate Fellow of the Royal Commonwealth Society, a 2014 One Young World Ambassador and Founder & Executive Director, Heal The World Foundation Nigeria.
Francis Bitonti
President and founder, Francis Bitonti Studio Inc.
- Bitonti merges 3D printing and artificial intelligence to bring product design into the information age.
Francis Bitonti's work has been published internationally in many prestigious institutions including the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and the Museum of Arts and Design and has recently has garnered media coverage for the 3D printed gown created for fashion icon Dita von Teese, which received numerous accolades and a great deal of public attention when it was debuted at Ace Hotel in New York City. His work has also been published internationally including publications such as Wired, The New York Times, Fast Company and The Wall Street Journal.Francis Bitonti currently lives in New York where he runs his design practice.
Arthur Kay
<h4>CEO, bio-bean Ltd[/h4]
- Kay's energy company bio-bean has industrialised the process of turning waste coffee grounds into advanced biofuels.
Arthur Kay Arthur Kay is an award-winning designer and entrepreneur, the co-Founder and CEO of bio-bean Ltd. He came up with the idea for bio-bean whilst studying architecture at The Bartlett, UCL, and in less than two years has raised several million in financing, built the world’s first coffee waste recycling factory and a team of twenty specialists. He currently holds positions on a number of boards associated with social enterprise and green entrepreneurship, and is a Fellow of the RSA and IoD. In 2013, Shell named him ‘the UK’s most Innovative Entrepreneur,’ he was appointed as a ‘London Leader’ by Mayor Boris Johnson, in 2014 he became one of NESTA’s ‘New Radicals’ and was named ’25 under 25 most influential Londoners’ by the Evening Standard. He was named the youngest ever Guardian Sustainable Business Leader of the Year in 2015.
Meg Schwamb
Planetary scientist and astronomer
- Schwamb is crowdsourcing the search for new planets outside our Solar System and the study of Mars' climate.
Meg Schwamb is a planetary scientist and astronomer studying the bodies in our Solar System and beyond. In collaboration with the Zooniverse, Meg uses crowd-sourcing or citizen science to tackle large astronomical and planetary datasets, engaging people worldwide directly in scientific research. She has collaborated with hundreds of thousands of people to search for new planets outside our Solar System and study the climate of Mars. Meg is a member of the science team for the Zooniverse's Planet Four project using human pattern recognition to map wind-blown seasonal fans appearing on Mars' South Pole.
Alisée de Tonnac
CEO & Co-Founder, Seedstars World
- Alisée has travelled the world, from Singapore to California, in search of the most exciting new markets.
As far as Alisée remembers, she has been traveling around the world, from Singapore to Italy, California to France & Switzerland. She started her career as product manager for luxury brands at L’Oréal Group before discovering her entrepreneurial spirit and taking off for a one-year world tour to set up the first edition of Seedstars World, an international startup competition focused on emerging markets. Alisée is now managing the company with the objective of spreading to 55 cities in 2015.
Daniel McDuff
Principal Research Scientist, Affectiva Research Affiliate, MIT Media Lab
- McDuff is building and utilizing scalable computer vision and machine learning tools to enable the automated recognition and analysis of emotions and physiology.
Daniel McDuff is Principal Research Scientist at Affectiva and a Research Affiliate at the MIT Media Lab. He is building and utilizing scalable computer vision and machine learning tools to enable the automated recognition and analysis of emotions and physiology. At Affectiva Daniel is leading the collection and analysis of the world's largest databaseof human emotions. Daniel completed his PhD in the Affective Computing Group at the MIT Media Lab in 2014 and has a B.A. and Masters from Cambridge University. His work has received nominations and awards from Popular Science magazine as one of the top inventions in 2011, South-by-South-West Interactive (SXSWi), The Webby Awards, ESOMAR and the Center for Integrated Medicine and Innovative Technology (CIMIT). His work has been reported in many publications including The Times, the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC News, New Scientist and Forbes magazine.
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Professor of Social Interaction, Loughborough University
- Stokoe analyses the science of talk using conversation analysis, in settingsincluding first dates, police interrogations, sales calls, and initial inquiries to services includingmediation and doctors’ surgeries.
Elizabeth Stokoe is Professor of Social Interaction in the Department of Social Sciences at Loughborough University, UK. She analyses the science of talk using conversation analysis, in settingsincluding first dates, police interrogations, sales calls, and initial inquiries to services includingmediation and doctors’ surgeries. She teaches on the BSc Social Psychology programme at Loughborough. Outside the university, she runs workshops with mediators, doctors, police and other professionals using her research-based communication training method called the ‘Conversation Analytic Role-play Method’. She has lectured at the Royal Institution and at TEDx, and her research and biography was the subject of BBC Radio 4’s “The Life Scientific”.
Fredrika Gullfot
CEO and founder, Simris
- Gullfot considers herself a 'green capitalist' and is a passionate advocate for bio-based solutions as key technologies for a sustainable future.
Fredrika Gullfot is the CEO and founder of Simris, a pioneering agribusiness growing algae in Southern Sweden. Simris' main focus is the production of omega-3 from algae as a sustainable alternative of fish oil, and has been appointed one of Swedens hottest new companies in tech. Fredrika holds a PhD in Biotechnology from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, and is the first female awarded with the Swedish Chemical Engineering Prize. Her professional history spans over a variety of industries, including investment banking, national security, entertainment and telecom. She considers herself a 'green capitalist' and is a passionate advocate for bio-based solutions as key technologies for a sustainable future.
Lining Yao
Material and Interaction Designer, Tangible Media Group, MIT Media Lab
- Yao has coined the term “material logic” to compute physical material’s shape, color, stiffness, texture and density.
Originally from Inner Mongolia, Lining Yao is conducting her PhD research at MIT Media Lab. She coins the term "material logic" to compute physical material’s shape, color, stiffness, texture and density. In her newest teamwork, "bioLogic", she introduces living microorganisms as natural nanoactuators and nanosensors. She proposes that actuators can be rather grown than manufactured, can be rather derived from nature than engineered in factory. Prior to MIT, she had been deeply involved in Chinese local design and manufacturing industry in Shenzhen and Hangzhou as a design consultant and entrepreneur.
Claudio Sassaki
Founder and CEO, Geekie
- Sassaki gave up his previous career in the financial sector to pursue his dream of transforming lives through education.
Claudio Sassaki is the founder and CEO of Geekie, a pioneer Brazilian company in the use of technology for personalised learning at massive scale -- more than 3 million students have already used the technological solutions developed by him and his team.Graduated in Architecture and Urbanism from Universidade de São Paulo (USP), he also did an MBA and Masters in Education in Stanford. After Stanford, Sassaki spent almost ten years in investment banking, having reached the position of VP at Goldman Sachs. In 2011, he gave up his career in the financial sector to pursue his dream of transforming lives through education and started Geekie.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
