Steve Briggs came to UCSD Biological Sciences from Diversa Corporation in La Jolla, where he served as Senior Vice President for R&D Platforms. Prior to his position at Diversa, he founded the Torrey Mesa Research Institute (originally named the Novartis Agricultural Discovery Institute) with funding from the Novartis Research Foundation. Dr. Briggs was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2000. He is a member of the City of San Diego Science and Technology Commission.

Dr. Briggs' formal training is in plant biology.   He was the first to isolate and characterize a plant gene for resistance to infectious disease, and the first to discover a natural mechanism for plant resistance to infection. He produced a draft sequence of the rice genome, which enabled comparative genomics in plants by reference to the recently completed arabidopsis genome sequence.  It provided a framework for genomics in all of the other grass crops (maize, wheat, barley, oats, rye, and sugarcane).  Dr. Briggs has published numerous discoveries about plant development and plant cell death. Recently, he moved into biomarker discovery in human physiology and disease.  Technologies he has helped develop are being focused on understanding and controlling chronic lymphocytic leukemia, embryonic stem cell fate determination, and infectious disease in plants.

Robert J. Cattolica, Associate Director of the Jacobs Schools' Center for Energy Research
Jacobs School of Engineering, UCSD
rcattolica@ucsd.edu

Website: http://maeweb.ucsd.edu/fluids.php

Professor Cattolica is Professor of Engineering Physics in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California at San Diego. He received his Ph.D degree in Engineering (Aeronautical Science) at the University of California at Berkeley in 1973. After completing his Ph.D degree he joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley as a National Science Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellow. From 1975 to 1990 he was a Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories, Livermore, California in the Diagnostics Research Division of the Combustion Research Facility. In 1991 he joined the engineering faculty in the Jacobs School of Engineering at UCSD.

Dr. Cattolica is the Associate Director of the Jacobs Schools' Center for Energy Research. He is the principal investigator of a new University of California research program (UC San Diego, UC Davis, UC Berkeley) jointly sponsored by West Biofuels, LLC and the UC Discovery Pilot Program that will investigate the thermochemical conversion of biomass to a renewable mixed alcohol fuel (ethanol, methanol, propane, butane, and pentanol). This conversion process has the potential to recycle the large biomass waste stream feedstock in California. The chemical kinetic mechanism for the combustion of the constituents in the mixed alcohol fuel will be developed at UCSD to predict combustion characteristics and pollutant emission. Internal combustion engine research will be conducted at UC Berkeley to investigate the effect of these mixed alcohol fuels in blends with gasoline on the performance and pollutant emissions in conventional and advanced flex-fuel engines.

Arthur Ellis, Vice Chancellor for Research
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, UCSD
abellis@ucsd.edu

Website: http://www-chancellor.ucsd.edu/qa_ellis.asp

Arthur Ellis holds Ph.D. and B.S. degrees in chemistry from MIT and Caltech, respectively. Dr. Ellis was a Professor of Chemistry and the Chair of the Graduate Materials Science Program at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Among his many awards are Guggenheim and Sloan Fellowships, the National Science Foundation Director's Meritorious Service Award and the NSF's Distinguished Teaching Scholar Award. Dr. Ellis and his co-workers have published more than 200 research papers in leading scientific journals and obtained nine patents.

As Vice Chancellor for Research, Dr. Ellis is responsible for overseeing UCSD's extensive research enterprise and for promoting, supporting and facilitating UCSD's research mission and the complex infrastructure required of a top-notch research institution. His responsibilities include Research Administration, Contract and Grant Administration, Technology Transfer and Intellectual Property, and Animal Care and Animal Welfare, while playing a leadership role in federal and state research relations. Dr. Ellis is working on a variety of research partnerships, including initiatives with the international community.

Brian Gregory Mitchell, Research Biologist and Senior Lecturer
Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UCSD
mitchell@spg.ucsd.edu

Dr. B. Greg Mitchell is a Research Biologist and Senior Lecturer at the University of California, San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO). Dr. Mitchell received his Bachelor of Science degree with honors in aquatic biology from the University of Texas at Austin. He received his doctoral degree in Biological Oceanography from the University of Southern California. After a year as a postdoctoral research scientist at SIO he joined the permanent research scientist staff as a biologist.

From 1990-1992 Dr. Mitchell served the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as Program Manager for the Ocean Biochemistry Program and Program Scientist for the SeaWiFS and MODIS ocean color satellite missions.

His research on phytoplankton photosynthesis, phytoplankton growth models, plankton ecology, ocean optics and satellite remote sensing has been sponsored by NASA, the Office of Naval Research, the National Science Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. His present research focuses on use of satellites to monitor change in global ocean ecosystems, including the impact of the El Nino cycle on the California Current, and future changes in the primary production of the Antarctic Ocean caused by glacial melt associated with climate change. Dr. Mitchell has published more than 60 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals and more than 150 conference proceedings or abstracts for national and international scientific meetings. For more than two decades he has promoted mass culture of algae to mitigate CO2 and wastewater nutrient loading, and to create biomass for fuel and animal food.

Justin Stege, Associate Director of Alternative Fuels
Verenium Corporation
Justin.Stege@verenium.com

Justin Stege is the Associate Director of Alternative Fuels at Verenium Corporation in San Diego, California. Since joining Diversa (now Verenium), in 2000, Justin has worked to discover and optimize proteins for therapeutic, animal nutrition, and alternative energy applications. A passionate environmentalist, Justin is focused on the application of biotechnology to enable the sustainable production of alternative fuels. Programs in his group include applications in forestry and sugar cane bagasse with collaborative efforts in North America, New Zealand and Brazil.

Justin is a native Californian with deep roots in San Diego, having completed at Ph.D. in Biology at UCSD followed by a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Carlos Barbas III and Dr. Roger N. Beachy at The Scripps Research Institute. Prior to joining the San Diego biotechnology community, Justin received a BS in Physics from Harvey Mudd College.