National Academy of Engineering to unveil Grand Challenges

February 8, 2008 | Source: KurzweilAI

An 18-member National Academy of Engineering committee — chaired by former U.S. Secretary of Defense William J. Perry and including Ray Kurzweil, as well as Google founder Larry Page, human genome pioneer J. Craig Venter, Nobel Prize winner Mario Molina, former National Institutes of Health director Bernadine Healy, and other leading technological thinkers — plans to propose the 21st Century’s “Grand Challenges for Engineering.”

The year-long effort received worldwide input from prominent engineers and scientists as well as the general public, and its conclusions were reviewed by more than 60 experts. “Success realizing any one of the challenges would dramatically improve life on Earth,” NAE officials told KurzweilAI.net.

On February 15, the “Grand Challenges for Engineering” will be simultaneously revealed to reporters at a news conference at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Boston at 2 PM and on the NAE website, where the public will be offered the opportunity to vote and comment on what they think is most important.