Speakers

Gary R. Allen, Ph.D. and M.S., Plasma Physics, Princeton; M.S., Nuclear Engineering, Penn State is a principal engineer in New Technology Introduction at GE Lighting. He has twenty-seven years (twenty-five at GE) of experience in lighting innovation and product development, covering all of the major lamp source technologies. Prior to lighting, he had five years of research experience in inertially confined nuclear fusion at Sandia National Laboratories, and five years in magnetically confined nuclear fusion in the Ph.D. program at Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.

Dr. Allen has several major publications, and forty issued U.S. patents. His expertise in light source science and technology includes metal halide, mercury, automotive, halogen, incandescent, fluorescent, and LED lamps as well as optical, thermal, photometric, and color sciences. In addition to holding a Ph.D. and M.S. in plasma physics from Princeton University, he holds a M.S. and B.S. in nuclear engineering, and a B.S. in engineering science from Penn State.

C. Daniel Azzara, Ph.D. and M.S., Food Science recently accepted an appointment as the Alan R. Warehime Professor of Food/Agribusiness in the College of Agricultural Sciences at Penn State.

Dr. Azzara is retired senior vice president, Global Research and Development, for the Hershey Company. In this role, he was responsible for the company’s product development, new technology, and product improvement functions. He joined the Hershey Company as a senior biochemist in 1986 and worked his way up the R&D organization. Prior to working at the Hershey Company for twenty-five years, he served as a graduate assistant at Penn State and a chemistry/biology teacher in Fairfax County, VA.

Dr. Azzara served on the boards of the National Confectioners Association (NCA), the International Food Information Council (IFIC), the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) and the Penn State Food Science Industrial Advisory Board. He was named Outstanding Alumnus from the College of Agricultural Sciences at Penn State in 2003. In addition to his doctorate and master's degree in food science from Penn State, he holds a bachelor's degree in science education from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

Mark A. Bechara, Ph.D. and M.S., Agricultural and Biological Engineering, is head of operations at Sylvan America. Before his role as head of operations, Dr. Bechara was a senior research scientist at Sylvan America during which he focused on product development and scale-up in the manufacturing of mushroom spawn (inoculum), biocontrol agents, and nutraceuticals. Prior to this, Dr. Bechara was an instructor at the Agricultural and Biological Engineering Department at Penn State in which he taught courses for juniors and seniors in the program. 

Dr. Bechara is a member of the honor societies Gamma Sigma Delta and Alpha Epsilon. He has co-authored several scientific articles and received scholarships and awards for his graduate research. Prior to Penn State, he received a B.S. degree in agriculture science from the American University of Beirut.

Jamal I. Berry, Ph.D., Bio-Analytical Chemistry, is manager of the Raw Materials Center- Analytical, in Research and Development (R&D) for Johnson & Johnson Consumer Companies, Inc. Dr. Berry is responsible for providing strategic leadership, planning and implementation of raw material efforts for Consumer Products in the North American region of the organization.

Previously, he was a senior research scientist in Global Product Design at The Procter & Gamble Company, responsible for leading formulation efforts in the development of new and existing consumer products within the Snacks Division. Prior to this, Dr. Berry was a senior research scientist and analytical liaison in Global Beauty Care R&D, where he supported the personal cleansing, skin and hair care categories to guide formulation efforts for key initiatives. He also led/co-led several key platforms for process transformation to enable higher throughput for mega billion dollar brands.

As a graduate student, Dr. Berry conducted research on Femtosecond Laser Desorption Ionization Mass Spectrometry for characterization of biomolecules from frozen matrices. During his graduate study, Dr. Berry received an NIH Graduate Research Supplement, Eberly College of Science Fellowship and was selected as a Sloan Scholar. As an undergraduate, he worked on GC-MS assay of brain phosphoinositides as a MARC Fellow at the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Berry was also a SURF Fellow at the California Institute of Technology where he conducted Fourier Transform Ion-Cyclotron Resonance Mass Spectrometry characterization of common MALDI matrices used in DNA analysis. In addition to being a recipient of several awards and fellowships, he was an Academic All-American and a member of Beta Sigma Chi Chemistry Honor Society.

Jhan Doughty Berry, Ph.D. and M.Ed., Counselor Education, is director of diversity and chief diversity officer at Educational Testing Service, where she developed and implemented three corporate-wide initiatives for underrepresented students and also was responsible for developing and implementing strategic partnerships with two universities to establish a pipeline of diverse talent within the organization.

Previously, Dr. Berry was the senior director for institutional diversity, Office of the President, Miami University of Ohio where she was responsible for creating a university-wide student retention program and also launched a community outreach and engagement program to increase underrepresented students in the STEM fields and created a program to establish a pipeline for diverse students to enter the field of government relations. Prior to this position at Miami University of Ohio, she was an adjunct assistant professor in the Departments of Educational Psychology and Psychology, where she taught courses in disability studies and served on multiple masters and doctoral theses committees.

Before joining Miami University of Ohio, she was an instructor in the Department of Counselor Education, Counseling Psychology & Rehabilitation Services at Penn State. Before that, she was an NIMH Postdoctoral Fellow in the Departments of Epidemiology & Public Health & Psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine, where she was responsible for serving as the project director for a NIH-NIMH funded grant to provide HIV/AIDS prevention/training to persons with psychiatric disabilities in both New York and Connecticut.

Erik S. Connors, Ph.D., Information Sciences and Technology; M.S., Chemical Engineering, is a senior research associate at SA Technologies, Inc., a cognitive engineering firm headquartered in Marietta, GA.

Dr. Connors has nearly a decade of experience in human factors engineering and research, user interface design, and cognitive modeling. Among his recent projects at SA Technologies are several control room research and design programs for multiple electric power transmission/distribution companies, the development of training solutions to improve situation awareness in novice Army network operation managers, and foundational research on cyber situation awareness for the Air Force Research Laboratory. His work experience includes the extensive design of warfighter-machine interfaces for all four branches of the military. Dr. Connors’ research has conducted many empirical studies of distributed teams investigating human performance, leadership, sociocultural behaviors, and team communication. He has also performed multiple types of qualitative research and knowledge elicitation including cognitive task analyses, concept mapping, ethnographic studies, and participant observation. He has extensive experience and expertise in the development of situation awareness-oriented interfaces for complex applications.

Dr. Connors is a member of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), and Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), and serves as reviewer for multiple peer-reviewed journals from each society. He is the author of over twenty-five papers and several book chapters on topics ranging from situation awareness in military operations, robotics, and automation, to team dynamics in emergency crisis management. In addition to his doctorate and master’s degree, Dr. Connors also earned a B.S. in chemical engineering from Penn State. During his doctoral studies, Lockheed Martin presented him with the IST Scholars Award.

Jack M. DeForrest, Ph.D., cardiovascular physiology, is president of JDF PharmaConsulting, a company specializing in technology transfer, technology licensing and alliance management in the pharmaceutical/biotech/life sciences arena. Following a three year post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Missouri, he accepted a research position with the Squibb Institute for Medical Research. He continued in this role for several years; during his research career, he authored or co-authored nearly one hundred scientific papers and abstracts.

After the merger with Bristol-Myers, Dr. DeForrest moved into the newly formed department of project management as Director Cardiovascular Projects. In his four years as project manager, his teams filed several NDA/SNDAs, including the landmark applications for the use of captopril in patients with myocardial infarcts or diabetic nephropathy. For the next six years, he was director of alliance management where he was responsible for managing several very large academic alliances, which included MGH, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Oxford, INSERM and the IGBMC in Strasbourg, France. In this role, he was also responsible for in-licensing technology for the development groups in the R&D organization.  In particular, Dr. DeForrest in-licensed several drug delivery technologies for BMS’ formulations group.

In 2001, Dr. DeForrest was recruited to head the WW technology licensing function at Amersham Health; in 2003, he was promoted to vice president, Technology Licensing. During his nearly ten years with Amersham and then GE Healthcare, he executed numerous licenses and put in place well over a hundred agreements of various types with pharmaceutical and biotech companies, and academic research institutions.

In addition to his doctorate, he holds a master of science degree in physiology and a bachelor of science degree in zoology from Penn State.

Gary L. Hall, M.Ed., Counselor Education, emphasis in criminal justice, is the executive director and founder of the Community Advocates’ Association for Children and Youth, Inc. located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Mr. Hall is responsible for all administrative responsibilities including implementing outreach social service activities, developing policies and service delivery processes, establishing and maintaining relationships with funding sources and social service agencies within the community, and fundraising.

Previously, Mr. Hall was a pre-release monitor for the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections in Philadelphia from 1991 to 1994.  Prior to this, he was an assistant director and youth service coordinator for the Crime Prevention Association at R.W. Brown Community Center in Philadelphia. 

Upon earning his graduate degree, Mr. Hall was employed by the G.E.D. Adult Basic Education Program as a teacher/vocational counselor at the State Correctional Institution at Huntingdon, PA. There, he later became the classification, treatment supervisor/clinic supervision, where he planned, organized and directed the classification and treatment programs, which included medical, psychological, psychiatric, religious, social, education, and recreational services.

Mr. Hall is affiliated with the Penn State Alumni Association, National Council on Crime and Delinquency, Pennsylvania Prison Society, Youth Services Bureau, Big Brother Association, and National Social Fraternity.

In addition to his master's degree, he holds a bachelor of science degree in law enforcement and corrections from Penn State.

Matthew Kinkade, Ph.D. is a recent graduate of the Intercollege Graduate Degree Program in Plant Physiology (now known as Plant Biology), and is currently the senior plant breeder at HM.Clause Seeds (formerly Campbell's Seeds), a business unit of Limagrain Group.

Dr. Kinkade is responsible for developing and commercializing processing tomato hybrid varieties with superior agronomic and horticultural performance for use in Campbell’s food and beverage products. He manages a diverse research team and a large, international germplasm development program, which is focused on developing conventional and specialty varieties used as innovative ingredients in Campbell’s expanding array of nutritious, great-tasting food products. In addition to practical plant breeding, Dr. Kinkade and his team execute applied genetics and food processing research experiments in collaboration with an array of public and private research groups. As a graduate student, he conducted applied genetics and breeding research in the lab of Dr. Majid Foolad, and successfully identified, mapped, and isolated novel quantitative trait loci for increased tomato fruit lycopene content. In addition, while at Penn State, he assisted in the effort to pyramid late blight resistance genes in tomato breeding germplasm adapted to the northeastern U.S.

Dr. Kinkade is a member of the American Society of Plant Biologists, the American Society for Horticultural Science, the Tomato Germplasm Cooperative, the Crop Science Society of America, and the National Association of Plant Breeders. He has co-authored several scientific articles published in prominent research journals and was the recipient of numerous scholarships and awards during his academic career. 

Huan Li, Ph.D. and M.S., Leisure Studies; Master of Applied Statistic, is a statistical analysis manager in the Digital Customer Experience team at Capital One Financial. 

Before her role with the Digital Customer Experience team, Dr. Li was a manager of Analytics at Amazon Web Service, building revenue forecast model for the global Amazon Web Service sales team. Prior to this, she was one of two founding members of the Data Analysis team in Risk Management at Facebook for one and half years, developing the team and reducing the financial risk associated with Facebook ads and credits. Her first job after graduating from Penn State was a senior statistician in Card Customer Management with Capital One Financial.

Upon admission to her graduate degree program at Penn State, she was awarded a University Fellowship, and in 2005, she served as vice-president of the Chinese Students Association at Penn State.

Steven E. Linberg, Ph.D., Applied Physiology, is president and chief executive officer of Airway Therapeutics, LLC.

Dr. Linberg has more than thirty years of both academic clinical research, and drug and biologics development experience, with expertise in directing complete drug development programs from IND to NDA. He initially worked in academia as a faculty member and clinical investigator, and has since held senior positions in the drug and biologics industry and at contract research organizations. Immediately prior to joining Airway, Dr. Linberg was managing director for Chiesi Pharmaceuticals Inc. from 2002 to 2010. 

Dr. Linberg is a current member and immediate past chair of the College of Arts & Sciences Advisory Council at the University of Delaware; a member of the American Physiological Society and the American Thoracic Society; and past member of the Penn State Graduate School Alumni Society Board of Directors. He was the recipient of an NIH pre-doctoral fellowship at Penn State, and the Pyle Scholarship at the University of Delaware. Dr. Linberg is also the editor and a contributing author of the text Expediting Drug and Biologics Development, now in its 3rd edition, and he teaches graduate courses in Drug and Biologics Development, Clinical Trial Design, and Clinical Trial Operations for the Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Linberg also holds a master of science degree in physiology from Penn State and a bachelor of science degree from the University of Delaware.

Arindam Sinharoy, Ph.D., Engineering Science & Mechanics; M.S., Engineering Mechanics is senior principal architect at ASML.

Dr. Sinharoy has worked in the semiconductor equipment industry for over fifteen years, in technical and leadership roles in the research and development of high precision mechatronics systems at Kulicke & Soffa, ESEC, and ASML. These systems are at the core of machines such as wire-bonders and photolithography scanners, used in semiconductor wafer fabs in the manufacture of integrated circuits (IC chips) that are the building blocks of computation, communications, industrial & consumer electronics products in the Information Technology age. His areas of expertise include mechanics, materials, control systems, and personnel management.

Dr. Sinharoy also holds a bachelor of technology degree in aeronautical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay.

Michele Steinmetz, Ph.D., Sociology and Demography; M.A., Sociology, currently works as a survey statistician in the Estimates and Projections area of the United States Census Bureau. Dr. Steinmetz is the methodologist for two projects related to the use of administrative records in producing the annual state and county estimates as well as a developer and a reviewer on other national, state and county estimates projects.

Dr. Steinmetz began her career at the Census Bureau in 2008 in Decennial Programs, managing several projects related to the 2010 Census. Before joining the Census Bureau, she was an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Nebraska at Kearney for two years. Dr. Steinmetz was also an associate population affairs officer and a consultant at the United Nations where she began the research for Child Adoption: Trends and Policies, a publication providing an overview of national policies regarding intercountry adoption and a compilation of data on the flows of children involved in intercountry adoptions.

Dr. Steinmetz is a member of the Population Association of America, the American Sociological Association and the American Statistical Association. While at Penn State, she received a Hewlett Foundation Award to support some of her dissertation work in Kenya. Since joining the Census Bureau, Dr. Steinmetz has received several internal awards for her work. She received a Special Act Award from management and the Employee of the Month award from her co-workers for her work on the Decennial Census. Since joining the Estimates and Projections area, she has also received several awards for her work on reviewing the Intercensal Estimates.

Jack Thompson, Ph.D., Curriculum and Instruction, Minor in Educational Psychology, recently retired as vice president of CTB/McGraw-Hill, where he was responsible for field and sales operations on the East Coast. The company is based in Monterey, California, and develops and scores large-scale, high stakes testing programs under contracts with state departments of education, cities, and school districts. The company tests approximately 40 million students and adult learners annually, and employs 800 professionals, including 75 Ph.D. research scientists, psychometricians, and content experts. While best known for book publishing, McGraw-Hill provides information services worldwide, publishes Business Week magazine, owns and operates Standard and Poor’s bond rating services and stock market indices.

Dr. Thompson enjoyed teaching mathematics for five years in Philadelphia before pursuing graduate work. At Penn State, he was a graduate teaching assistant for courses in tests and measurement, an interest that led to his career in testing. His Ph.D. minor concentrated on educational measurement and statistics. Following graduation, Dr. Thompson was appointed assistant superintendent on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. He joined CTB/McGraw-Hill in 1983 as an evaluation consultant, and has held several positions within the company.

Dr. Thompson has received several awards and has been recognized for his contributions to the assessment industry. He is a frequent presenter at the National Conference on Large Scale Assessment and at the National Council on Measurement in Education’s annual meeting; he has authored articles for the Studies in Educational Evaluation and for School Science and Mathematics. He is a member of Pi Lambda Theta, Phi Delta Kappa, and the National Association of Test Directors.

Dr. Thompson holds a master of arts degree from Glassboro State College and a bachelor of science degree from West Chester University.

James H. Trask, Ph.D., Economics, Yale; M.A., Economics, Penn State, is the owner and principal of Foundational Strategies LLC, providing business decision and financial planning support related to electrification of the transportation industry.

From 2010 to 2012, Dr. Trask was vice president of Business Development at Azure Dynamics Corporation, a world leader in the development of electric and hybrid commercial vehicles. Prior to joining Azure, Dr. Trask held a number of executive positions in finance, planning, and economics during a twenty-seven year career at General Motors. From 2007 through 2009, he was the finance executive responsible for all hybrid, electric, and fuel cell powertrains at GM, and the finance executive responsible for the Chevrolet Volt electric vehicle. His earlier positions include CFO of GM Global Fuel Cell Activities, director of Global Benchmarking, planning director of GM-Japan in Tokyo, project manager at Abt Associates (Cambridge, MA), and consultant to the UN Centre for Housing, Building, and Planning.

With a broad background in technology, international business negotiations, and financial planning, Dr. Trask has thirty years of experience bringing financial and strategic solutions to technical environments in manufacturing, engineering, and research organizations.

Dr. Trask has held a number of board and leadership positions, including Trustee of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan (2003-2006), member of the Board of Managers of Giner Electrochemical Systems (2007-2009), Board of Directors of GM-Allison Japan (Tokyo) (1989-1990), and Co-Founder and Board Member of the Society of Automotive Analysts (1987-2006). He was named a U.S.-Japan Leadership Fellow in 1988. Dr. Trask is a member of the American Economic Association, the Society of Automotive Engineers, the Detroit Economic Club, and the Electric Drive Transportation Association.

Dr. Trask also earned a bachelor of science degree in mathematics from Penn State.

Jeffrey A. Withum, Ph.D., Fuel Science, is principal advisor science for MRIGlobal. MRIGlobal is an independent, not-for-profit organization that performs contract research for government and industry.

Dr. Withum has been with MRIGlobal for two years. He is responsible for managing a group that provides economic and engineering analysis and modeling support to the Office of Program Planning and Analysis at the U.S. Department of Energy, National Energy Technology Laboratory. Prior to MRIGlobal, he held various positions at CONSOL Energy for twenty-five years in strategic planning, technical marketing services, and the research and development departments.

In addition to his doctorate, he holds a bachelor of science degree in chemistry from Notre Dame.

Haijun (Daniel) Wu, Ph.D., Food Engineering, has been working at Giorgio Foods, Inc. in Reading, Pennsylvania with the title of senior food scientist and process specialist since his graduation from Penn State in 2009. Giorgio Foods is the largest mushroom grower and processor in the U.S. Dr. Wu’s major responsibilities at Giorgio Foods are to establish and oversee food safety systems across the organization, implement research and development and process improvement projects, and provide technical services for customers. 

In 2005, he received his fellowship and scholarship from Penn State and started his study in the food engineering program. Before that, he worked at H.J. Heinz China as a senior food technologist between 2003 and 2005. In 2003, he received his M.S degree in biological engineering at South China University of Technology.

Dr. Wu is a certified HACCP Manager, Safe Quality Foods Practitioner, and the Thermal Process Authority of canning operation at Giorgio Foods. He is the member of International Food Technologist, American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, and Institute for Thermal Processing Specialists.