About Peter Daszak, PhD

Dr. Peter Daszak, President of EcoHealth Alliance, is a leader in the field of conservation medicine and a respected disease ecologist. EcoHealth Alliance is a global organization dedicated to innovative conservation science linking ecology and the health of humans and wildlife. EcoHealth Alliance's mission is to provide scientists and educators with support for grassroots conservation efforts in 20 high-biodiversity countries in North America, Asia, Africa, and Latin America.Previous to his current position, Dr. Daszak was the Executive Director of EcoHealth Alliance's Consortium for Conservation Medicine (CCM) - a collaborative think-tank of institutions. Dr. Daszak's research has been instrumental in revealing and predicting the impacts of emerging diseases on wildlife, livestock, and human populations. Dr. Daszak has also consulted for other non-profit organizations and governmental agencies such as the OIE ad hoc working group on amphibian diseases, the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. Department of the Interior, International Union for the Conservation of Nature, National Institutes of Health, Australian Biosecurity CRC, DIVERSITAS, Society for Conservation Biology, and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. Dr. Daszak has been called upon time and again to advise governmental, commercial, and non-commercial organizations including, NASA and leading pharmaceutical companies on issues ranging from the environment to national security. With an impressive track record of more than 100 peer-reviewed published papers, Dr. Daszak has also authored book chapters, and his research has been featured in such publications as Nature, Science, The Lancet, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Trends in Ecology and Evolution. Dr. Daszak's work has been the focus of extensive media coverage, including articles in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, The Washington Post, TIME and broadcast appearances on 60 Minutes II, CNN, ABC News, NPR's Talk of the Nation, Morning Edition, and BBC News.

About The Honorable Andrew C. Weber

The Honorable Andrew C. Weber is the principal advisor to the Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics for matters concerning nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs. As the ASD(NCB), his mission is to prevent, protect against, and respond to these global threats. Mr. Weber is the Staff Director of the Nuclear Weapons Council, which manages the nuclear weapons stockpile, and he oversees the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program.  Since taking office, Mr. Weber has overseen an expansion of Nunn-Lugar programs into new regions, including Africa and South Asia. He has also been a key player in reforming the nation's medical countermeasures enterprise. His nuclear duties include executing President Obama's direction that as the U.S. reduces the number of deployed weapons; we are assured that the remaining stockpile is safe, secure, and effective. Prior to his appointment by President Obama, Mr. Weber served for 13 years as an Adviser for Threat Reduction Policy in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. He played a key role in Nunn-Lugar operations to remove weapons grade uranium from Kazakhstan and Georgia, and nuclear capable MiG-29 aircraft from Moldova. Mr. Weber also developed and oversaw the Department of Defense Biological Threat Reduction Program. For his work at the Department of Defense, Mr. Weber has twice been awarded the Exceptional Civilian Service Medal.  Most of Mr. Weber's 26 years of public service have been dedicated to reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction. He served previously as a United States Foreign Service Officer, with diplomatic assignments in Saudi Arabia, Germany, Kazakhstan, and Hong Kong. From 2002 through 2008 Mr. Weber taught a course on Force & Diplomacy at the Edmund A. Walsh Graduate School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He has a Master of Science in Foreign Service degree from Georgetown and is a graduate of Cornell University. Mr. Weber speaks Russian and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

About Nicholas Preston, PhD

Dr. Nicholas 'Nico' Preston is the Director of Data Science and Research Technology (DART) at EcoHealth Alliance (EHA). His research in computational disease ecology (a blend of ecology, computing, and health) combines data mining, web technology, and statistical modeling to assess infectious disease threats to human, animal, and ecosystem health. Through emerging web technologies and cloud computing, Dr. Preston builds complex computer models and biosurveillance platforms to monitor global ecosystems and understand how they respond to human impacts. Dr. Preston is currently exploring global media and field data to identify new diseases, pathogens, or environmental risks. Dr. Preston's doctoral training was in ecosystem ecology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison Center for Limnology (CFL), with a certificate in global health and postdoctoral work in global health informatics at the UW-Madison Global Health Institute (GHI) and Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment (SAGE). His postdoctoral work on HealthScapes, and underlying dotSkapes technology, has continued at EHA through web platforms designed to support and enhance collaborative global environmental health research. Nico founded the DART lab at EHA - a dynamic team of data scientists and software developers that draw upon interdisciplinary backgrounds in ecology, computer science, and health. The lab is developing flagship projects, such as the Sicki web encyclopedia, to pinpoint the origins of infectious diseases by curating and analyzing historic disease media through dynamic web applications. Sicki builds upon EHA's expertise in developing 'hotspot' maps of infectious diseases. This historic perspective from Sicki informs our field programs and virtual biosurveillance laboratories. The next generation of technology being developed combines recommendation engines, adaptive models, and decision support tools to monitor, detect, and diagnose emerging threats in real-time dashboards for analysts.

About EcoHealth Alliance