Max Elder is a Research Director in the Food Futures Lab at the Institute for the Future, the world's leading futures thinking organization. Max has led work around the world with food companies like Barilla, Hershey's, and Campbell's; major foundations like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; and innovative technology companies like Google and Intel. He has written for, and been quoted in The New York Times, The Guardian, NPR, Quartz, Fast Company, and many others. Max has published in dozens of peer-reviewed journals and books; his research is taught at universities across the US, including Harvard Law and Oxford University; and he speaks around the world on topics related to food systems and ethics. Max is also the youngest fellow at the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, an international think tank in Oxford, England, pioneering ethical perspectives on animals.

Currently, Ms. Tutwiler chairs boards of the Water, Land and Ecosystem Research Program of the CGIAR, the Access to Seeds Foundation, and Bioversity USA. She is also a Senior Fellow with the Meridian Institute and a Senior Advisor with SystemIQ. Previously, she was Director General of Bioversity International, a $30M agricultural research for development organization with over 300 staff based in 16 countries. In that capacity, she was elected to serve on the System Management Board of the CGIAR. She was Deputy Director General, Knowledge for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, where she led FAO's work in agriculture, natural resource management, forestry and fisheries, as well as knowledge sharing, knowledge management, and capacity development. She was Coordinator, Global Food Security, Office of the Secretary at USDA where she led and coordinated USDA's participation in the President's Feed the Future initiative. She founded a think tank on agricultural trade policy; built the agricultural development portfolio for the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and headed government relations for a global agribusiness company. She holds a Masters in Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University and Bachelor of Arts from Davidson College. She holds certificates in agribusiness management from INSEAD and Purdue University.

Sonny Ramaswamy is president of Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities, which accredits institutions of higher education by applying evidence-informed standards and processes to support continuous improvements and promote student achievement and success. Sonny served for six years as President Barack Obama's appointee as the Director of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture in Washington, DC. He provided leadership and strategic direction in the formulation of broad, national policies needed to develop and execute cutting edge science and its application to promote profitability of the food and agricultural systems while protecting the environment and creating economic opportunities. Previously, Ramaswamy held a number of academic positions, including: dean of Oregon State's College of Agricultural Sciences; director of Purdue's Agricultural Research Programs; university distinguished professor and head of Kansas State's Entomology Department; and professor of entomology at Mississippi State. He has published over 150 journal articles, book chapters, and a book, and has a patent. Sonny is the recipient of a number of awards and honors, including Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the Entomological Society of America, Food Systems Leadership Award for Extraordinary Impacts on Food Systems, Agriculture Future of America's Leader in Agriculture Award, and Hutchinson Medal from the Chicago Botanic Garden. Ramaswamy received his Bachelor of Science in agriculture and Master of Science in entomology from the University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore, India. His doctorate is in entomology from Rutgers University.

Dr. Siegel is an Associate Professor of Chemistry, Biochemistry & Molecular Medicine, at UC Davis in the Genome Center. He received his B.S. in Biochemistry from UC Davis in 2005 and his Ph.D. in Biomolecular Structure and Design from the University of Washington in 2011, after which he returned to UC Davis to begin his research lab. His scientific focus in the design and discovery of enzymes of interest to modern society. Through strong industrial and cross-disciplinary collaborations Dr. Siegel has engineered enzymes for a wide range of applications, from treating human diseases such as Celiac Disease to the development catalysts for the productions of fuels and chemicals. In recent years Dr. Siegel has begun to explore in greater depth the application of enzymes within the food systems to promote health and sustainability. Dr. Siegel has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship. Beyond academic Science Dr. Siegel is deeply engaged with the translation of research. He is the founder of four companies (with more on the way), is the Director of Business Development for the Rosetta Commons, and is the Faculty Director of the Innovation Institute for Food and Health (IIFH) at UC Davis. As the Faculty Director of the IIFH he has led the efforts getting the institute off the ground to build a platform to accelerate the innovation cycle and facilitates deployment of products or processes that enable safe, sustainable, and secure nutrition for all.

Bernhard began his career with Baker and Pastry Chef apprenticeships in Germany. He completed his PhD in Food/Biotechnology at the Technical University of Berlin, Germany. His work experience includes Unilever Germany (Food Technologist), RJR Nabisco (Research Director) and the Buehler Group in Switzerland (Vice President R&D Food). In 1994 Bernhard joined General Mills, Inc. in Minneapolis and was Chief Scientific Officer and Vice President for Technology Strategy. Bernhard authored/co-author over 150 patents, established a Game Changer program and created a 'Technology Venturing' initiative, enabling faster and high impact innovations. Bernhard is Honorarium Professor at the Technical University of Berlin, Germany and Fellow of the Institute of Food Technologists, Chicago. Bernhard has been an invited participant in round table discussions under the Obama Administration at the White House Office for Science and Technology Policy on global protein security. Bernhard retired from General Mills in 2015 and founded 'Seeding the Future Foundation', a 501 (c) 3 organization focusing on post-harvest loss reduction in Sub Saharan Afrika. He also founded 'Food System Strategies LLC', a strategic advisory firm supporting primarily start-ups along the food system value chain. In 2016 he served at Beyond Meat as acting CTO and Head of R&D and joined Beyond Meat's Board in 2018. Bernhard serves as a Board member of the German Institute of Food Technology (DIL) and several other organizations in the US and Europe.

Howard Shapiro has been involved with sustainable agricultural and agroforestry systems, plant breeding, molecular biology and genetics for over 45 years. He has worked with indigenous communities, NGO's, governmental agencies and the private sector around the world.

Shapiro is a Senior Fellow at UC Davis, College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences. In 2007 Howard was made a Distinguished Fellow of the World Agroforestry Centre and authored the IAASTD chapter on Biotechnology and Biodiversity. He was co-chair of the 1st and 2nd World Congress of Agroforestry and served as Chairperson of the External Advisory Board of the Agriculture Sustainability Institute at UC Davis. In 2009 he was named recipient of The Award of Distinction from The College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, UC Davis. He led the global effort sequencing, assembling and annotating the Theobroma cacao genome, and initiated the Arachis genome.

Shapiro founded the African Orphan Crops Consortium (AOCC) and the African Plant Breeding Academy (AfPBA) in 2011 to sequence, assemble and annotate 101 key food cultivars, which are the backbone of African nutrition. In October of 2017 he launched with collaborators the Foldit Aflatoxin Puzzle with 460,000 gamers to redesign and improve enzymes to degrade the aflatoxin.