Professor Genevieve Bell is the 13th and first female Vice-Chancellor of the Australian National University. Holding a PhD in cultural anthropology from Stanford, she is renowned for her work at the intersection of cultural practices and technology. Genevieve has spent over two decades in Silicon Valley with Intel and is a key voice in global AI and human society debates.

In 2017, Genevieve returned to Australia where she established the 3A Institute at ANU, focusing on AI-enabled cyber-physical systems, and later became the inaugural Director of the ANU School of Cybernetics. In addition to her roles at the ANU, Genevieve is a Member of the Prime Minister's National Science and Technology Council, Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering (ATSE), member of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) AI Council, and an Officer of the Order of Australia.

Associate Professor Julia Powles, Director of the UWA Tech & Policy Lab 

Julia Powles is the Director of the UWA Tech & Policy Lab and Associate Professor of Law and Technology at the University of Western Australia. She is an international research leader in privacy, intellectual property, internet governance, and the law and politics of data, automation, and artificial intelligence. Her current research interests include Big Tech culpability, tech crimes, and data governance in health and performance contexts. Julia serves on Australian federal and state committees on generative AI in education, AI and copyright, privacy and responsible information sharing, responsible AI, and robotics. Prior to joining UWA, she worked at Cornell Tech, NYU, Cambridge, The Guardian, and the World Intellectual Property Organization. Julia studied genetics, biophysics, and law at ANU and UWA, and received her master’s from Oxford and PhD from Cambridge. 

John Noel Viana, Research fellow, Justice and Technoscience Laboratory, School of Regulation and Global Governance, ANU 

John Noel Viana is a research fellow at the Justice and Technoscience Laboratory of the School of Regulation and Global Governance at the Australian National University. His work focuses on social justice, diversity, and equity in healthcare and biomedical research. He has examined gender, racial, and geographic diversity in various precision health applications – from palliative care to mental health and infectious diseases. His recent publications underscore the need to promote intersectional inclusion in precision medicine, examine responsible innovation through an Antipodean lens, and address epistemic injustice in bioethics discourse. 

Emma Burns, Data and AI Specialist, Environment and Sustainability, Microsoft

Since completing her doctoral research at UNSW in conservation genetics and phylogeography, Emma has worked in various roles in environmental consulting, research, government (both State and Commonwealth), and industry. She is currently a Data and AI Specialist, Environment and Sustainability, with Microsoft. Emma is passionate about solving problems using science and technology for public good outcomes and has published extensively on diverse topics in ecological research, natural resource management and science-policy. She serves on the Editorial Board for Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems, Agroecology and Ecosystem Services and is a proud mother of three wonderful children.

Hayley Teasdale & Chris Anderson, Australian Academy of Science

Hayley Teasdale has experience in delivering science policy projects and developing innovative methods for producing science policy advice. She was named Women’s Agenda Emerging Leader in Science in 2024 for her work developing new methods for science advice that were inclusive of Traditional Knowledges. She has experience as a researcher turned entrepreneur, has worked for multiple start-ups in Australia and the US and has been involved in research translation and commercialisation in the fields of health tech and robotics.  

Chris Anderson is the Director of Science Policy at the Australian Academy of Science, where he leads efforts to translate scientific research into actionable policy recommendations. With decades of experience in Australian science and higher education, Chris has worked in both political and non-political roles, including advising Ministers of Science and Higher Education.

Throughout his career, Chris has spearheaded significant initiatives to enhance science policy, most notably during the COVID-19 pandemic, where he played a pivotal role in the Academy's leadership of the Rapid Research Information Forum. His work spans a broad spectrum of critical topics, including climate change impacts, data-intensive research, greenhouse gas removal, the Great Barrier Reef, and the influence of external forces like geopolitics and artificial intelligence on the science system.

Guy Blucher, Defence Science and Technology Group

Guy Blucher has been working on applied AI in the Defence domain for more than 2 decades. The bulk of his career has been focussed on applying computer vision techniques at scale to multi-model imagery data problems, with a strong focus on software engineering practice as an enabler.  More recently he has been maturing the computational and software engineering environment of Defence Science and Technology Group (DSTG) through the provision of common enabling tools and services to accelerate computational science and AI innovation inside Defence.  In August 2024, Guy was seconded from DSTG to a leadership position within the newly established Defence AI Centre.

Katharina (Katie) Freund, School of Medicine and Psychology 

Katie Freund leads a team of educational designers in the School of Medicine and Psychology at ANU, advising academic staff on best practice in education and effective use of technology. Katie has a research background in digital communication and now investigates the use of virtual reality, AI, and multimedia in education.