Mark S. Rea, Ph.D., is Professor of Architecture and Cognitive Sciences at the Lighting Research Center (LRC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He served as LRC Director from 1988 to 2017.

Dr. Rea is well known for his research in circadian photobiology, mesopic vision, psychological responses to light, lighting engineering, and visual performance. He is the author of more than 250 scientific and technical articles related to vision, lighting engineering, and human factors and was the editor-in-chief of the 8th and 9th editions of the Illuminating Engineering Society (IES) Lighting Handbook. He has been elected Fellow of the Society of Light and Lighting (UK) and Fellow of the IES. In addition, he is recipient of the IES Medal. Rea has also been honored with the William H. Wiley Distinguished Faculty Award for those who have won the respect of the faculty at Rensselaer through excellence in teaching, productive research, and interest in the totality of the educational process. Dedicated to the notion that our society undervalues light because we do not properly measure its benefits, his recent book Value Metrics for Better Lighting brings together a wide range of research to illustrate how the effective use of light can benefit society and the environment.

Robert White, M.D., is a graduate of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and has been Director of the Regional Newborn Program at Beacon Children’s Hospital since 1981.

His primary interest has been in advancing structural and operational strategies to provide the optimal NICU environment of care for babies, families, and caregivers. To this end he has written many papers, co-founded and chairs the Consensus Committee to Establish Recommended Standards for Newborn ICU Design, and co-directs the Gravens Conference on the Physical and Developmental Environment of the Newborn and the International Conference on Brain Monitoring and Neuroprotection in the Newborn.

Mariana Figueiro, Ph.D., is Director of the Lighting Research Center (LRC) and Professor of Architecture at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She has also served as Light and Health Program Director at the LRC since 1999.

Dr. Figueiro is well known for her research on the effects of light on human health, circadian photobiology, and lighting for older adults. She holds a bachelor’s in architectural engineering from the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, and a master’s in lighting and a doctorate in multidisciplinary science from Rensselaer. Her master’s and Ph.D. dissertation research focused on the human circadian response to light. Figueiro is the recipient of the 2007 NYSTAR James D. Watson Award, the 2008 Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, and the 2010 Rensselaer James M. Tien ’66 Early Career Award. In 2013 she was elected Fellow of the Illuminating Engineering Society. She is the author of more than 80 scientific articles in her field of research, along with the AARP-sponsored publication, Lighting the Way: a Key to Independence, which provides guidelines for the design of lighting to meet the needs of older adults. Her research is regularly featured in national media including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Scientific American. Dr. Figueiro has also brought attention to the significance of light and health as a topic of public interest through her recent TEDMED talk

Roger N. Beachy, Ph.D., is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He is an Appointed Member of the National Science Board (NSF) and of the Policy and Global Affairs Committee at the National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council.

He was appointed by President Obama as Director of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where he served from 2009 to 2011. Dr. Beachy was Founding President of the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center. Previous appointments include Professor of Cell Biology at The Scripps Research Institute, Professor of Biology at Washington University, and Executive Director of the Global Institute for Food Security at the University of Saskatchewan, Canada, and at the World Food Center at UC Davis.

He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Microbiology, and a Foreign Associate/Fellow of the Korean Academy of Sciences, India National Academy of Sciences, and The World Academy of Sciences. He has been awarded the Wolf Prize Laureate in Agriculture and the Ruth Allen Award from the American Phytopathological Society, among many other awards and citations.

Dr. Beachy is currently a member of the Board of Directors of SoAR, and a member of the Council of Scientific Advisers of the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB, a UN organization). He also serves on the Board of Directors for Indigo Agriculture, Performance Plants, and MicroGen Biotech, and as Chief Science Officer at Kultevat, Inc. His current focus includes increasing collaborations and innovations in science, and in science policy.

Chris Wolgamott has, for over 20 years, worked in the utility business in the Pacific Northwest, as a program manager, efficiency engineer, and product manager. As the Senior Product Manager for Commercial and Residential Lighting with NEEA, Chris leads all emerging tech research on lighting products to support transformation of the commercial and residential lighting markets. He works extensively with lighting manufacturers on where the future of lighting and controls are headed.

Chris started his energy efficiency career at NW Natural Gas Co., working with residential and commercial customers to find ways to more efficiently use natural gas. After 6 years in the natural gas industry, he decided to fuel switch and went to work for Eugene Water & Electric Board, a local public utility. Chris worked with the commercial energy efficiency department to promote electric conservation. It was during this time that he found his passion for lighting. Seven years later he moved to Portland, Oregon, to work as a contractor for Bonneville Power Administration. During his three years at BPA, Chris was the commercial lighting energy efficiency engineer for the Energy Efficiency department. His time as the lighting engineer was spent working with the utilities of the Northwest to promote high quality and efficient lighting.

Govi Rao a passionate champion of sustainability, has more than 25 years of experience globally, across several industries, including specialty chemicals, coatings, building materials, lighting, energy and the rapidly evolving IoT space.

As co-founder and Managing Partner of Carbon Group Global (CGG), Govi is currently leading CGG’s vision to scale transformational social impact solutions, specifically to address education, total resiliency of women and resource efficiency. Prior to CGG, Govi was the President and Chief Executive Officer of Noveda Technologies, a pioneer in water and energy management solutions, based in Bridgewater, NJ. Govi is the former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lighting Science Group Corporation, a leading LED lighting solutions company. He was instrumental in envisioning and establishing Lighting Science as an innovative pacesetter in the emerging LED lighting space.

Previously, Govi was Vice President and General Manager of the Philips Solid State Lighting business in North America. He also held several other leadership roles at Philips, including Vice President of Business Creation & Brand, where he was responsible for product management, strategic marketing, branding and sustainability. Prior to joining Philips, Govi spent over a decade with specialty chemicals leader Rohm and Haas Company (now part of Dow Chemicals) in various leadership roles across a range of businesses and geographies. In addition to his experience with a wide business portfolio, Govi has extensive functional expertise that includes strategic planning, product management, marketing, operations, leadership development and general management. Widely traveled across Asia, Europe and the Americas, Govi has a keen sense of value creation in emerging markets and technologies, grounded on the principles of sustainability. Govi has built winning teams that achieved extraordinary goals in start-ups as well as mature businesses – pioneering and inspiring profitable and sustainable growth.

Janet Joseph is the Senior Vice President for Strategy and Market Development at the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

She leads NYSERDA’s work in building decarbonization, advancing programs and policies to deliver a carbon-neutral building stock. Ms. Joseph has more than 28 years of experience in clean energy. She has held technical, policy and leadership positions at NYSERDA, where she has spearheaded initiatives to develop solar and renewable power, build a cleantech startup industry, launch energy storage collaboratives, and identify greenhouse gas reduction strategies that provide benefits for New Yorkers. Prior to joining NYSERDA, Ms. Joseph was a research scientist at Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratory. Ms. Joseph serves on the Boards of the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships, Urban Green, New York State Center for Future Energy Systems, and the Urban Futures Lab. She has a Master’s degree in Environmental Chemistry from the University of Maryland.

Zigurts Majumdar, Ph.D., is the Director of Development and Senior Lecturer at the Lighting Research Center (LRC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Dr. Majumdar has broad experience in academia, industry, and as an entrepreneur in translating science and technology to application. He is regarded as an expert in biophysics and optical spectroscopy and has applied his expertise in diverse areas including energy, medicine, defense, forensics and the environment. In addition to publications and patents, he has extensive experience developing and managing solutions-driven R&D efforts for numerous government and private organizations, including more than 10 programs as a consultant to DARPA and ARPA-E.

Dr. Majumdar holds a bachelor’s in physics from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he won the Drickamer Research Fellowship for his thesis research under Professor Robert Clegg in the Laboratory for Fluorescence Dynamics. He was a 2005 recipient of an NRC postdoctoral fellowship and worked at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland with Dr. Robert Bonner, helping develop non-invasive imaging methods for early detection of retinal abnormalities, such as auto-fluorescence and macular pigment spatial distributions, as part of the Age Related Eye Disease Study 2 (AREDS-2). Next, he spent over 6 years at Booz Allen Hamilton, helping clients develop and manage large R&D portfolios, developing imaging and sensing technologies, and working in product development, and won several awards, including a Booz Allen Excellence Award. Most recently, he founded his own company, Zin-X, offering consulting services to the U.S. Department of Energy and other organizations and has been active in developing low-cost approaches to spectral imaging for forensics, health and environmental applications.

Jerry Duffy is the General Manager of Technology for GE Lighting. He is responsible for Lighting’s complete product portfolio and directs strategic investments for new product introductions.

Jerry joined GE Lighting in 1988. After completing GE’s Edison Engineering training program, Jerry joined the High Intensity Discharge (HID) lamp engineering team. While in HID, he developed new products in a range of areas. In 2002, he was named Global Technology Manager for GE’s HID business. In this role, Duffy and his team delivered a stream of new products, major capacity programs and key cost-out projects.

In 2008, Jerry was appointed General Manager of LED Technology for GE Lighting Solutions. In this role, Jerry led GE’s global team of engineers in developing new LED products. Under his direction, the team launched a wide range of products, including outdoor systems, indoor systems and LED replacement lamps.

Jerry attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, graduating with a B.S. in Physics in 1988. He also holds an M.S. in Physics and an M.B.A. from Case Western Reserve University. Originally from New Jersey, Jerry resides in Solon, Ohio.

Jeremy Snyder is the Director of Energy Programs at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lighting Research Center, where he leads projects related to energy efficiency.

He directs the Lighting Energy Alliance, which conducts research and outreach on behalf of member utilities and efficiency agencies. Some of Mr. Snyder’s recent projects include a demonstration of LED lighting in residences across New York State, an evaluation of wireless lighting controls, a study on using behavioral techniques to increasing occupants’ use of light switches, development of a desktop lighting controller, and investigating energy savings from luminaire integrated controls. Mr. Snyder is also an award-winning video producer and has experience with technical communication using interactive multimedia. Mr. Snyder was trained as a mechanical engineer and has previously worked on fuel cells, solar power, wind power, and hydrogen energy.

Peter M. Schwartz, born in Chicago, IL, began his energy career over 41 years ago. His deep energy and utility experience combined with innovative approaches to technology has led him to be an internationally recognized and a frequent speaker on energy efficiency, building and Smart Grid technologies.

He currently is a Principal Investigator in the Building Technology and Urban Systems Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he manages research teams investigating advanced, networked lighting controls, demand response, energy adaptive building control and Smart Grid-enabling technologies. Earlier in his career, he was Director of Business Energy Management at Pacific Gas and Electric Company, where he managed their $76 million per year, commercial and industrial energy-efficiency program portfolio. He also previously ran his own energy infrastructure consulting practice for 15 years. He received his B.Sc., in Environmental Physics from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, specializing in technology assessment, energy policy and environmental politics, and his M.E.P., (Master of Environmental Planning), specializing in building energy technology and analysis, from Arizona State University.

Francis Rubinstein is a retired lighting scientist with over 35 years experience in researching ways to make lighting systems more energy efficient and user friendly. He is an internationally-recognized expert in advanced lighting controls in buildings and was Principal Investigator and Group Leader of the Building Technology Department’s Lighting Research Group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, before retiring from the Lab in 2014.

Over his career, he was technical lead for numerous demonstrations of advanced lighting controls in buildings and was awarded the Vice-Presidential National Performance Award (“Hammer” Award) in 1996 for the lighting controls demonstration he led at the San Francisco Federal Building. He was the U.S. Department of Energy’s lighting expert for the Greening of the White House Initiative under President Clinton in 1993. The “sliding setpoint” algorithm he invented is widely used in daylighting systems today. He has published extensively in the area of advanced lighting controls demonstrations, commissioning of daylighting systems, and has special interest in the area of daylighting, simulation and visualization. Between 2006 and 2010, he conducted several demonstrations of LEDs with lighting controls as part of the General Service Administration’s Green Proving Ground. Rubinstein spearheaded the successful effort to get controllable lighting into the 2013 revision of California’s Title 24 Building Code. He is also a Fellow of the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America.
Rubinstein currently runs a consulting firm, RubyLight Consulting, where he has conducted technology evaluations for several lighting companies and pro-bono work for We Care Solar, which develops solar-powered systems to help in women’s health clinics in developing countries. He is particularly interested in new projects which leverage new lighting communication techniques to improve human health in residential lighting, the effects of circadian lighting on health and well-being and the use of new technology to improve the daily lives of people who are living with disabilities.