The New York Academy of Sciences is one of the oldest scientific organizations in the United States, founded in 1817. A nonprofit professional society with more than 20,000 members across 100 countries, it convenes scientists, students, policymakers and the public to advance research, education and expertise. Its work spans flagship recognition programs like the Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists and the Tata Transformation Prize, global STEM education through the Junior Academy and Global STEM Alliance, crisis-response coordination via the International Science Reserve, and the long-running peer-reviewed journal Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.
Andrew Huberman is a tenured professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford University School of Medicine and the host of the Huberman Lab podcast - regularly ranked the #1 health and science podcast in the world with over 400 episodes. His Stanford lab investigates visual system repair, neural plasticity, and stress resilience, publishing in Nature, Science, and Cell. A former skateboarder who once wrote for Thrasher magazine and lobbied the Palo Alto city council to build a skate park at age 13, Huberman translates complex neuroscience into actionable protocols for millions of listeners globally.
Philipp Dettmer is the founder, CEO, and head writer of Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell, the Munich-based animation studio and YouTube channel with over 25 million subscribers and 3.6 billion views. Starting as a university passion project in 2013, Kurzgesagt has grown into a 70-person studio that transforms dense scientific, philosophical, and technological ideas into visually stunning, widely-shared short films. Dettmer is also the author of 'Immune: A Journey Into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive' (2021) and co-creator of the video game Star Birds, launched in early access in September 2025.
Dr. Katelyn Jetelina is an epidemiologist, data scientist, and one of America's most influential science communicators. She founded Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE) in March 2020 as a few sentences to update her UT Health students about COVID-19 - and somehow that turned into a 365,000-subscriber newsletter reaching people in 133 countries with over 500 million total views. Named a TIME100 Most Influential Person in Health, she translates complex public health science into actionable insights twice a week, covering everything from vaccines and bird flu to gun violence and federal health policy. She holds a PhD in Epidemiology and Biostatistics, consults with the CDC, and serves as an adjunct professor at Yale School of Public Health - all while raising two daughters and having visited 50+ countries.
Dr. Katherine (Katie) Mack is a theoretical astrophysicist, science communicator, and author who holds the inaugural Hawking Chair in Cosmology and Science Communication at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. Known online as @AstroKatie with over 400,000 Twitter/X followers, she studies the fundamental questions of how the universe will end - dark matter, vacuum decay, primordial black holes - and makes it all thrillingly accessible. Her 2020 book 'The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)' was a New York Times Notable Book. She publishes 'The Last Star' newsletter, co-hosted a podcast with John Green, is an instrument-rated pilot, and was name-dropped by Hozier in a Grammy-winning album.