The Neha Anwar Podcast

Dr. Elizabeth A. Strychalski leads the Cellular Engineering Group at NIST, which she founded as part of the agency’s Engineering Biology Program. Her research focuses on discovering and testing fundamental rules to predict and control the engineered function of biological systems. She also serves on the Steering Group for Build a Cell.Dr. Strychalski earned a B.S. in Physics and a B.A. in Religious Studies from the University of Rochester, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Physics from Cornell University. She began her career at NIST as a National Research Council Postdoctoral Research Associate, working in nanofabrication, nanofluidics, and confined biopolymers.She later served as a Program Manager in the Biological Technology Office at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), where she managed a roughly $120M portfolio advancing experimental and theoretical research at the interface of synthetic biology, control engineering, nanobiotechnology, and fluidic devices. She then returned to NIST to establish her current group. Her honors include the University of Rochester’s Harry W. Fullbright Prize and Janet Howell Clark Award, and the Maryland Academy of Sciences Young Scientist Award.https://www.nist.gov/people/elizabeth-strychalskihttps://scholar.google.com/citations?user=NFKe46wAAAAJ&hl=en

Professor Simon Conway Morris is a groundbreaking palaeontologist at the University of Cambridge. He is internationally recognised for his pioneering research on the Cambrian explosion and his meticulous analysis of the Burgess Shale fauna. These studies have significantly reshaped our understanding of the early evolution of animal body plans and the dynamics of evolutionary innovation. Conway Morris’s most distinctive contribution is the articulation and empirical substantiation of evolutionary convergence—the recurrence of similar biological forms and behaviours across vastly different evolutionary lineages. Through a vast body of scholarship and in his popular books Life’s Solution (2003), The Runes of Evolution (2015), and From Extraterrestrials to Animal Minds (2022), he has shown that evolutionary pathways may be far more constrained and directional than previously assumed.

Patricia Smith Churchland is a Canadian-American analytic philosopher noted for her contributions to neurophilosophy and the philosophy of mind. She is UC President's Professor of Philosophy Emerita at the University of California, San Diego, where she has taught since 1984.

Kendra Tuthill, Film Worker, Screenwriter, and Southern Gothic novelist living in Albuquerque New Mexico

Scott Sumner is an American economist best known as a leading proponent of market monetarism, a school of thought that argues central banks should target nominal GDP (NGDP) growth rather than inflation or interest rates. He taught economics for many years at Bentley University and has been affiliated with the Mercatus Centre at George Mason University, where he has continued his research and writing.Sumner rose to wider prominence during and after the 2008 financial crisis through his blog The Money Illusion, where he argued that the Federal Reserve's monetary policy was too tight and that NGDP level targeting would have produced a faster, more stable recovery. His ideas influenced subsequent debates among economists and policymakers about the conduct of monetary policy, and he is often credited with helping popularise market monetarism as a distinct school of macroeconomic thought.He is the author of several books, including The Midas Paradox (2015), which examines the causes of the Great Depression through a monetary policy lens, and The Money Illusion: Market Monetarism, the Great Recession, and the Future of Monetary Policy (2021).

Patrick Winn is an award-winning investigative journalist. He specialises in rebellion and black markets in Southeast Asia.Winn is the author of two narrative non-fiction books: Narcotopia: In Search of the Asian Drug Cartel that Survived the CIA (PublicAffairs / Icon Books)Hello, Shadowlands: Inside the Meth Fiefdoms, Rebel Hideouts and Bomb-Scarred Party Towns of Southeast Asia (Icon Books)Winn is a long-time contributor to The World, a radio program broadcast on more than 300 NPR stations across America. His writing and short documentaries have appeared in/on The New York Times, Rolling Stone, the BBC, The Atlantic and many other outlets. He has received the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award (also known as the ‘poor man’s Pulitzer’) and a National Press Club award. He’s also a three-time winner of Amnesty International’s Human Rights Press Awards, among other prizes. Winn is a member of 2050 Productions, a small Bangkok-based team telling Southeast Asian stories through documentary video, audio and reportage.Winn has appeared on screen as an expert source on two documentaries.Narco Wars (National Geographic, broadcast on Hulu), Season Three, Episode Two: “Prince of Death”The Business of Drugs (Netflix), the “Meth” episode.Winn was an associate producer on Hope Frozen, a Netflix original documentary, and a field producer for the debut Myanmar episode of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown. Both won Emmys.Winn was raised in Eden, a dwindling North Carolina factory town that once manufactured carpets and beer. He graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in 2003 with a degree in journalism. His early reportage explored economic decay in the American South and crime within the US military.Since 2008, Winn has lived in Bangkok and reported on Southeast Asia. He reads and speaks Thai — and occasionally sings it, badly, in upcountry karaoke joints.

Arnold Kling is an American economist, author, and one of the internet's earliest and most influential economics bloggers. After earning a PhD in economics from MIT, he spent years working as an economist at the Federal Reserve and as a senior economist at Freddie Mac from 1986 to 1994. He then pivoted to the tech world, founding and later selling the company Homefair.com for $85 million. Since 2000, Kling has been a prolific writer and blogger, co-founding EconLog with Bryan Caplan and David R. Henderson and later launching his own site, askblog. He's an Adjunct Scholar at the Cato Institute and affiliated with the Mercatus Centre at George Mason University. He's also the author of several books exploring economics and political thought, including Specialisation and Trade, Unchecked and Unbalanced, and his best-known work, The Three Languages of Politics, which offers a framework for understanding how liberals, conservatives, and libertarians talk past each other.

Rev. Dr. Robin Hoover is a prominent social ethicist dedicated to the well-being of migrating people along the southwest border of the United States for 40 years. A native of West Texas, he has earned degrees in journalism, religion, social ethics, and political science. As the author of 'Creating Humane Borders: A MigrationEthic' and several articles and book chapters, Hoover has shared his insights on migration across every major media market globally, testified before congressional committees, and presented at numerous leading universities. He has founded and led various nonprofit organisations that have provided millions of dollars in aid to migrants, emphasising the critical importance of migrant safety resources. Since 1980, his work as a pastor in progressive mainline congregations has centred on organising congregations, denominations, and volunteers to deliver essential services to individuals crossing the. U.S.-Mexico border. His focus on immigration reform includes ensuring migrant safety, humanitarian aid, and legal resources that can significantly improve the lives of migrants. Currently, his efforts are directed towards offering vital information to migrants, particularly those from Central America, to help them navigate Mexico safely and survive the journey across the border. His dedication to this cause has been documented in the Special Collections Library at the University of Arizona, and he has received numerous accolades, including the 2006 Mexico’s National Human Rights Award from then-President Felipe Calderon. Hoover’s extensive travels in Mexico and Central America have led him to collaborate with elected officials and public administrators from over a dozen countries, affirming that migrants matter and deserve the support they need.https://robinhoover.com/

William C. Ratcliff is a Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at Georgia Institute of Technology and serves as the Director of the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Quantitative Biosciences (QBioS). He is widely recognized for his research on the evolution of multicellularity, social evolution, and bet hedging, combining experimental and theoretical approaches. His work often explores how single-celled organisms transition to multicellular life forms, with notable studies involving yeast models.Dr. Ratcliff earned his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 2011, where he conducted research on microbial ecology and evolution. His groundbreaking work includes the experimental evolution of multicellularity, which has been featured in high-impact journals such as Nature Communications and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. He has also contributed to understanding ecological and evolutionary dynamics in microbial communities.At Georgia Tech, Dr. Ratcliff leads an active research lab focused on evolutionary biology and biophysics, mentoring students and postdoctoral researchers. His contributions to science include both fundamental insights into multicellular evolution and applications in biotechnology.

Ricard Solé is an ICREA research professor at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra, where he heads the Complex Systems Lab. He holds degrees in Physics and Biology from the University of Barcelona and a PhD in Physics from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. Prof. Solé is also an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute and a fellow of the European Center for Living Technology. His research focuses on the evolutionary origins of complex systems, synthetic biology, and unstable evolutionary dynamics. He has published over 250 scientific papers and is a frequent keynote speaker at international conferences. Solé is known for his work on synthetic major transitions and terraforming endangered ecosystems.