Matthew Ackerman is the Founder and CEO of QDIR. He earned his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry at the University of Chicago where he developed high-performance infrared photodiodes using colloidal quantum dots as an inexpensive material alternative for the scalable production of infrared image sensor arrays. He received an M.S. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Chicago and a B.S. in Chemistry from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
Karin Calvinho’s company, RenewCO2, was founded in 2018 as a spin-off of research she was involved in at Rutgers University as a Ph.D. candidate. She chose to research catalysts for energy applications because they have an impact on the quality of life of all human beings. This field has critical and challenging problems to solve, such as decarbonizing energy production. She uses the toolbox of chemistry, materials science, and manufacturing technologies to look for solutions that close the carbon loop and help mitigate the environmental effects of catalytic processes.
Pranav Gokhale received his doctorate in quantum computer architecture at the University of Chicago. He developed Super.tech as an extension of the research project EPiQC: Enabling Practical-Scale Quantum Computation, which is the flagship quantum computer science project of the National Science Foundation. His goal is to help bridge the gap between existing theoretical algorithms and practical quantum computing architectures.
Margaret Kocherga received her doctoral degree in Nanoscale Science from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Her focus was organic-inorganic hybrid materials for the next generation of organic electronics. In 2019, she founded her start-up company, Margik, to further explore the potential of these materials.
Christopher Passolano received his doctoral degree in Materials Science and Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). His primary goals are conservation and improved energy storage. He focused on high performance rechargeable batteries because they are the foundational technology that will play a critical role for the success of several emerging industries such as electric vehicles, electric aircraft (particularly electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing aircraft), and commercial drones.
Carol Scarlett is the founder of Axion Technologies, LLC, which is working on the next generation of encryption devices, a true random number generator. She holds a doctorate in particle physics from the University of Michigan and is an Assistant Professor of Physics at Florida A&M University. The idea for Axion’s focus came from work being performed in experimental nuclear and particle physics to determine how light should be deflected after repeated quantum interactions.
