STANFORD UNIVERSITY
STANFORD EMERGING TECHNOLOGY REVIEW
Reporting on Key Technology Areas and their Policy Implications
About
Emerging technologies are transforming societies, economies, and geopolitics. This moment brings both promise and peril. In every era, technological advances are used in nefarious ways that inventors never imagined and slow-moving governments stymie innovations in ways that policymakers never intended. The stakes today are especially high. Great power competition between the US and China is the defining feature of the 21st century – and emerging technologies will determine who will win and what values will shape the international order.
Seizing the opportunities and mitigating the risks of science and engineering breakthroughs takes work. It requires US leadership to ensure that new technologies advance free societies rather than empowering autocracies. And it demands vigorous collaboration between academia, the private sector, and the US government to ensure that innovations uphold American values and serve American national interests.
The Stanford Emerging Tech Review is an ambitious university-wide effort that emerged from conversations with senior American government officials who asked, “What should we know about emerging tech at Stanford?” There was no single resource, no compendium of frontier technological research efforts on campus, and no systematic discussion bringing together scientists, engineers, and social scientists to assess the policy implications, opportunities, and risks of emerging technologies being invented in our own departments and laboratories that are shaping the world.
The Review aims to help fill this vital gap by producing an annual report that accounts for new developments in key technology areas at Stanford University and highlights key policy implications, needs, opportunities, and barriers for US government decision makers and private sector leaders.
TEN TECHNOLOGY FOCUS AREAS
Artificial Intelligence
Biotechnology Synthetic Bio
Cryptography Blockchain
Energy
Generation / Storage / Transmission
Nano Material Science
Neuroscience
Nuclear
Robotics
Semiconductors
Space
Satellites / Comms / Propulsion
CO-CHAIRS
Amy Zegart
Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
CO-CHAIRS
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Amy Zegart
Amy Zegart is the Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and Professor of Political Science (by courtesy) at Stanford University. She is also a Senior Fellow at Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Chair of Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence and International Security Steering Committee, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. She specializes in U.S. intelligence, emerging technologies and national security, grand strategy, and global political risk management.
Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow
Amy Zegart is the Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and Professor of Political Science (by courtesy) at Stanford University. She is also a Senior Fellow at Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Chair of Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence and International Security Steering Committee, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. She specializes in U.S. intelligence, emerging technologies and national security, grand strategy, and global political risk management.
Condoleezza Rice
Director, Hoover Institution
CO-CHAIRS
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Condoleezza Rice
Condoleezza Rice is the Tad and Dianne Taube Director of the Hoover Institution and a Senior Fellow on Public Policy. She is the Denning Professor in Global Business and the Economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. In addition, she is a founding partner of Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC, an international strategic consulting firm.
Tad and Dianne Taube Director | Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy
Condoleezza Rice is the Tad and Dianne Taube Director of the Hoover Institution and a Senior Fellow on Public Policy. She is the Denning Professor in Global Business and the Economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. In addition, she is a founding partner of Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC, an international strategic consulting firm.
Jennifer Widom
Dean, School of Engineering
CO-CHAIRS
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Jennifer Widom
Jennifer Widom is the Frederick Emmons Terman Dean of the School of Engineering and the Fletcher Jones Professor in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University. She served as Computer Science Department Chair from 2009-2014 and School of Engineering Senior Associate Dean from 2014-2016. Jennifer received her Bachelor's degree from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in 1982 and her Computer Science Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1987. She was a Research Staff Member at the IBM Almaden Research Center before joining the Stanford faculty in 1993. Her research interests span many aspects of nontraditional data management. She is an ACM Fellow and a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences; she received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2000, the ACM SIGMOD Edgar F. Codd Innovations Award in 2007, the ACM-W Athena Lecturer Award in 2015, and the EPFL-WISH Foundation Erna Hamburger Prize in 2018.
Frederick Emmons Terman Dean Of The School Of Engineering, Fletcher Jones Professor Of Computer Science And Professor Of Electrical Engineering
Jennifer Widom is the Frederick Emmons Terman Dean of the School of Engineering and the Fletcher Jones Professor in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University. She served as Computer Science Department Chair from 2009-2014 and School of Engineering Senior Associate Dean from 2014-2016. Jennifer received her Bachelor's degree from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in 1982 and her Computer Science Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1987. She was a Research Staff Member at the IBM Almaden Research Center before joining the Stanford faculty in 1993. Her research interests span many aspects of nontraditional data management. She is an ACM Fellow and a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences; she received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2000, the ACM SIGMOD Edgar F. Codd Innovations Award in 2007, the ACM-W Athena Lecturer Award in 2015, and the EPFL-WISH Foundation Erna Hamburger Prize in 2018.
John Taylor
Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
CO-CHAIRS
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John Taylor
John B. Taylor is the George P. Shultz Senior Fellow in Economics at the Hoover Institution and the Mary and Robert Raymond Professor of Economics at Stanford University. He chairs the Hoover Working Group on Economic Policy, co-chairs the Hoover Technology, Economics and Governance Working Group, and is director of Stanford’s Introductory Economics Center.
George P. Shultz Senior Fellow in Economics
John B. Taylor is the George P. Shultz Senior Fellow in Economics at the Hoover Institution and the Mary and Robert Raymond Professor of Economics at Stanford University. He chairs the Hoover Working Group on Economic Policy, co-chairs the Hoover Technology, Economics and Governance Working Group, and is director of Stanford’s Introductory Economics Center.
DIRECTOR / EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Herbert Lin
Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
CO-CHAIRS
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Herbert Lin
Dr. Herb Lin is Hank J. Holland Fellow in Cyber Policy and Security at the Hoover Institution and senior research scholar for cyber policy and security at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, both at Stanford University. His research interests relate broadly to policy-related dimensions of cybersecurity and cyberspace, and he is particularly interested in the use of offensive operations in cyberspace as instruments of national policy and in the security dimensions of information warfare and influence operations on national security.
Dr. Herb Lin is Hank J. Holland Fellow in Cyber Policy and Security at the Hoover Institution and senior research scholar for cyber policy and security at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, both at Stanford University. His research interests relate broadly to policy-related dimensions of cybersecurity and cyberspace, and he is particularly interested in the use of offensive operations in cyberspace as instruments of national policy and in the security dimensions of information warfare and influence operations on national security.
ADVISORY BOARD
Hon. Jerry McNerney
Former U.S. House of Representatives from California
Hon. Steven Chu
William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Physics, and Professor of Molecular and Cellular Physiology, and of Energy Science and Engineering at Stanford University. Former Secretary of Energy
John Hennessy
Shriram Family Director, Knight-Hennessy Scholars
Lloyd B. Minor, MD
Carl and Elizabeth Naumann Professorship for the Dean of the School of Medicine, Professor of Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery (OHNS) and, by courtesy, of Neurobiology and of Bioengineering
Thomas M. Siebel
Founder of Siebel Systems Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at C3.ai
LEARN MORE
Stanford University is tightly coupled to the scientific and technological innovation ecosystem and has been for many years. The Stanford Emerging Technology Review (SETR) is an effort to produce a periodic report for policy and leadership audiences that accounts for new and important scientific and technical developments at Stanford University across ten technological areas and identifies barriers, needs, and opportunities for progress in each area.
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News
During keynote remarks at the Hoover Institution’s 2022 Tech Track II Symposium, Hoover Institution director Condoleezza Rice announced the Fall 2023 publication of The Stanford Emerging Tech Review, a new multidisciplinary collaboration in which scholars and experts from Stanford will summarize contributions of university researchers in areas of critical technology over the past year.