Robert Atlas is the former Chief Meteorologist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), and is currently Director Emeritus of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, Fla. Some of the areas he focuses his current research on include the prediction, movement and strengthening of hurricanes. He has worked with both satellite data and computer models as a means to study these hurricane behaviors. Dr. Atlas received his Ph.D. in Meteorology and Oceanography in 1976 from New York University. Prior to receiving the doctorate, he was a weather forecaster in the U.S. Air Force where he maintained greater than 95 percent forecast accuracy. From 1976 to 1978, Dr. Atlas was a National Research Council Research Associate at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, an Assistant Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science for SUNY and Chief Consulting Meteorologist for the ABC television network. In 1978, Dr. Atlas joined NASA as a research scientist. He served as head of the NASA Data Assimilation Office from 1998-2003, and as Chief meteorologist at NASA GSFC from 2003-2005. Dr. Atlas has performed research to assess and improve the impact of satellite temperature sounding and surface wind data since 1973. He was a key member of the team that first demonstrated the significant impact of quantitative satellite data on numerical weather prediction and is the world’s leading expert on Observing System Simulation Experiments, a technology that enables scientists to determine the quantitative value of new observing systems before funds are allocated for their development. He served as a member of the Satellite Surface Stress Working Group, the NASA Scatterometer (NSCAT) Science Team, the ERS Science Team, the SeaWinds Satellite Team and the Working Group for Space-based Laser Winds, the Scientific Steering Group for GEWEX, Chairman of the U.S. World Ocean Circulation Experiment (WOCE) Advisory Group for model-based air-sea fluxes, and the Council of the American Meteorological Society. He is currently a member of the Science Teams for two NASA space missions. From 1974-1976, he developed a global upper-ocean model and studied oceanic response to atmospheric wind forcing as well as large-scale atmospheric response to sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies (unusual events). In more recent years, his research concentrated on the role of how the air and sea interacts in the development of cyclones, the role of soil moisture and unusual SST events in the initiation, maintenance and decay of prolonged heat waves and drought, and most recently on the modeling and prediction of hurricane formation, movement and intensification.

John R. Birge is the Jerry W. and Carol Lee Levin Distinguished Service Professor of Operations Management at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Previously, he was Dean of the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science and Professor of Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences at Northwestern University. He also served as Professor and Chair of Industrial and Operations Engineering at the University of Michigan, where he also established the Financial Engineering Program. He is former Editor-in-Chief of Mathematical Programming, Series B, former President of INFORMS, and current Editor-in-Chief of Operations Research. His work focuses on stochastic optimization methods and analysis as well as applications in multiple domains. His honors and awards include the CORS Harold Larnder Prize, IIE Medallion Award, the INFORMS Fellows Award, the MSOM Society Distinguished Fellow Award, the Harold W. Kuhn Prize, the George E. Kimball Medal, the William Pierskalla Award, and election to the US National Academy of Engineering. He received M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University in Operations Research, and an A.B. in Mathematics from Princeton University.

PETER W. GLYNN is the Thomas Ford Professor in the Department of Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University. He is a Fellow of INFORMS and of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, has been co-winner of Best Publication Awards from the INFORMS Simulation Society in1993, 2008, and 2016, and was the co-winner of the John von Neumann Theory Prize from INFORMS in 2010. In 2012, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. His research interests lie in stochastic simulation, queueing theory, and statistical inference for stochastic processes.

SABINE HERLITSCHKA is Chief Executive Officer and Chief Technology Officer of Infineon Technologies Austria AG. Her professional career includes industrial biotechnology research, international research & innovation management and financing, internships at leading U.S. organizations (National Science Foundation, American Association for the Advancement of Science), Fulbright Scholar at George Washington University and Johns Hopkins University/SAIS, as well as founding vice-rector for Research Management & International Cooperation at the Medical University of Graz (Austria). Before joining Infineon Technologies Austria, Herlitschka was Director of European and International Programs in the Austrian Research Promotion Agency. For more than twenty years she has been involved in strategic European Research & Innovation Programs as project coordinator, evaluator, and member in pioneering European & international expert groups. Amongst others, she is chair of the Governing Board of ECSEL – the Electronic Components and Systems for European Leadership Program. Herlitschka holds a Ph.D. in Food- and Biotechnology with Postdoc specialization in molecular biology and genetic engineering and a Master of Business Administration.