We at GCRI recognize that our current team lacks demographic diversity. We wish to support demographic diversity in the field of global catastrophic risk, including within our own team. For more information, please see the GCRI Statement on the Demographic Diversity of the GCRI Team, January 2023.
Seth Baum, Ph.D.
Executive Director
seth [at] gcrinstitute.org
New York City
Seth Baum leads GCRI’s planning and management and contributes to GCRI’s research. He is also a Research Affiliate of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge. He holds a Ph.D. in Geography from Pennsylvania State University (2012), an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Northeastern University (2006), and a B.S. in Optics and Applied Mathematics from the University of Rochester (2003). He completed a post-doctoral fellowship with the Center for Research on Environmental Decisions at Columbia University and was a Fellow of the Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity program of the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins University.
Tony Barrett, Ph.D.
Director of Research
tony [at] gcrinstitute.org
Washington, DC
Tony Barrett oversees GCRI’s research activities and contributes to organization planning and management. He is also a Non-Resident Fellow with the Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity (CLTC) at UC Berkeley, and a Senior Policy Analyst at the Berkeley Existential Risk Initiative (BERI). He was recently the Lead for Advanced Analytics – Machine Learning at ABS Consulting. He holds a Ph.D. in Engineering and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University (2009) and a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, San Diego (2000). He was a postdoctoral research associate at the National Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE) at the University of Southern California and a Fellow in the RAND Stanton Nuclear Security Fellows Program.
Gary Ackerman is Associate Professor in the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity at the University at Albany, State University of New York. He was previously a GCRI Associate and also Director of the Unconventional Weapons and Technology Division at the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), based at the University of Maryland. He advises GCRI in particular regarding the development of new research organizations as well as the national and international security dimensions of global catastrophic risk, including with the United States government and the Washington, DC policy community. He also contributes to GCRI research.
Seán Ó hÉigeartaigh is Executive Director of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge. He was previously based at the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford. He also helped establish the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, a joint project of Cambridge, Oxford, and the University of California, Berkeley. He advises GCRI on a range of matters related to the study of global catastrophic risk, the development and management of research institutes, and the wider community of individuals and organizations involved in global catastrophic risk.
