Professor of Building Technology Program in the Department of Architecture in MIT and Director of MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative

Professor Fernández is first and foremost a practicing architect who has designed more than 2.5 million square feet of new construction in major cities around the world including New York City, Tokyo, and Shanghai.

His work in sustainability began with research regarding materials for high performance buildings, low energy residence, and urbanization.

• He founded the MIT Urban Metabolism Group to focus his research on the resource intensity of cities as well as on design and technology pathways for future urbanization, taking part in projects across four continents.

• He is a member of more than 15 organizations, the most prestigious of which being his role on the Board of Directors of the Building Envelope Technology and Environmental Council of the National Institute of Building Science; New Ecology, Inc; and the Center for Sustainable Energy of the Fraunhofer Institute.

• He is also a proud author of two books and numerous articles in scientific and design journals, as well as a speaker for conferences and symposia around the world.

Jeremy Gregory is the Executive Director of the MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium. He studies the economic and environmental implications of engineering and system design decisions, particularly in materials production and recovery systems.

Research topics include product and firm environmental foot-printing, manufacturing and life-cycle cost analysis, and characterization of sustainable material systems. He has applied these methods, often with industry partners, to a range of products and industries, including pavements, buildings, automobiles, electronics, consumer goods, and waste treatment and recovery. Gregory earned a BS in mechanical engineering from Montana State University, and an MS and PhD in mechanical engineering from MIT.

Siddiqi’s research develops systems-theoretic methods, with data-driven analysis, for novel insights to inform design, decisions, and policy for engineered systems. The methods combine simulation, optimization, and decision analysis. Her recent work has focused on new hydropower, desalination, waste-to-energy, and agriculture systems, and on understanding the systemic interconnections between water, energy, and food security.

• Siddiqi earned her B.S. in mechanical engineering, M.S. in aeronautics and astronautics, and Ph.D. in aerospace systems, all from MIT.

• She received the Rene H. Miller Prize in Systems Engineering and was a recipient of the Amelia Earhart and Richard D. Dupont fellowships.

• Siddiqi has co-authored one book and over 90 publications in some of the world’s foremost technical and scientific journals.

Jessika Trancik is a professor in the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research examines the impacts of technologies and the reasons behind technological change. She has developed theory and predictive models to understand why some technologies improve faster than others, and what technology features enable rapid innovation. Her work focuses in particular on accelerating clean energy development by informing decisions made by engineers, policy makers, and private investors. This work spans all energy services including electricity, transportation, heating, and industrial processes. Her theories and models have been applied to new and developing energy technologies, such as solar energy and batteries, and to electricity and transportation systems. Her models have also been used to inform government innovation policy, and applied in diverse industries, including finance, healthcare, manufacturing, software, and consumer products. Her work has been published in journals such as Nature, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Nature Energy, Nature Climate Change, and Environmental Science and Technology, and has been featured by news outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Financial Times, and NPR.

Three blurbs:

• Professor Trancik received her B.S. from Cornell University and her Ph.D. from the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar.
• She develops data-informed models to evaluate the economic and environmental impacts of energy technologies over time and space.
• Trancik’s models for forecasting technological change have informed engineering design, public policy, and investment portfolios.