Expert Network

Background: As Associate Director of the Digital Advisory portfolio within DAI’s Center for Digital Acceleration, Anand Varghese works with clients to develop digital strategies, design and implement digital-focused activities, train staff on the use of digital platforms for development, and identify local partners. He has served as a technical advisor to the Kosmos Innovation Center (KIC) in Accra, Ghana, where he helped young technology entrepreneurs develop digital solutions for the local agricultural sector. He also teaches a course on ‘Digital Development: Innovative Use of Technology in Emerging Markets’ at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies. Prior to joining

DAI, he served as Senior Manager at the PeaceTech Lab at the U.S. Institute of Peace. Anand played an integral role in creating and launching the Lab, the Institute’s first nonprofit spin-off in its 30-year history. Anand has managed various technology-related development projects, including the first nationwide mobile phone-based survey in Afghanistan, workshops for youth activists on crowdsourced mapping tools, and partnerships with universities to integrate young engineers into conflict management. Anand speaks regularly at international conferences and has authored studies on topics at the intersection of digital technology and international development. He hails from Bangalore, India.

Background: Dr. Timothy Laseinde is an NRF-rated engineering academic in the Mechanical & Industrial Engineering Department at the University of Johannesburg, in Johannesburg Gauteng, South Africa. His seventeen years of engineering experience cuts across the industry, academia, and the development sector. Timothy worked with UNICEF and other civil societies as a consultant. He has published extensively in journals, books, and proceedings in his current career. His research interest is predominantly in performance improvement of energy systems (transmission and distribution), renewable energy structures design

and maintenance, safer engineering design practices, Life Cycle assessment, low carbon economy and closely related multidisciplinary fields. He is an Engineering-X SEEL champion, “Safer End of Engineered Life”. He has past and ongoing awards and grants funded by the British Council, Royal Academy of Engineering, the South-African National Research Foundation (NRF), and the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) South Africa. As a program/project manager and research team leader, he has significantly impacted the industry and the engineering education sector.

Background: Daniel Mokrauer-Madden is a Project Manager at Precision Development based in Nairobi, Kenya. He earned MS degrees in International Agricultural Development and Agriculture & Resource Economics at University of California, Davis, (USA).

Previously, he was a Peace Corps volunteer in Kenya and co-founded the Twende Social Innovation Center in Arusha, Tanzania. He enjoys playing Ultimate Frisbee in his spare time.

Background: Timo Marquez is a Sustainability Marketing Manager at Saint Gobain. He supports Saint Gobain’s global businesses develop sustainable solutions on three pillars: carbon & energy, circularity & resources, and health & wellbeing. He engages the international community of sustainability ambassadors by sharing their expertise and best practices, and advocates for more sustainable markets. Since 2005, Timo has served as Project Director in the topic of sustainability and the built environment in

Venezuela, Switzerland, South Africa and France. He also served as Director of Energy Efficiency Programs within School of Architecture at Universidad Mayor in Chile, and volunteered in several organizations, including ASME’s the Technology & Society Division (2003-2011), Fundacion Araucania Verde and InspiraRED (2013-2014) and HEC Alumni Association (2018-2021). Timo holds a B.S in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Zulia (Venezuela), a MSc in Sustainable Energy Engineering from the Royal Institute of Technology KTH (Sweden), and an MBA from HEC Paris (France). He currently lives in France with his wife and son.

Background: Ruth Salmon is an Innovation Manager at Elrha’s Humanitarian Innovation Fund. In this role she designs and manages funding calls for innovative solutions to gaps in WASH humanitarian responses. Before working at Elrha, she worked for a non-profit consultancy designing and scaling innovative financing programmes in the WASH, health and education sectors across East and West Africa. She has also worked in monitoring and evaluation and

research roles and provided technical assistance to the government of Sierra Leone for two years. She is passionate about using research and innovation to improve development outcomes, and how collaboration between actors from differing perspectives and schools of thought can achieve this. Ruth has a Bsc in International Development Studies and an Msc in Research for International Development from the University of London.

Background: Dr. Carmelo De Maria, PhD in Material Engineering MEng in BME, is Assistant Professor of Bioengineering at the Department of Information Engineering, and affiliated with the Research Center “E. Piaggio” of University of Pisa. He is guest professor in bioengineering at Addis Ababa University, and member of the African Biomedical Engineering Consortium secretariat. His research interests are in the field of additive manufacturing/rapid prototyping

technologies, with a particular focus in Biofabrication. He has several papers published in international scientific journals (over 50) and in 2016 he received the 1st award as Young Investigator from the International Society for Biofabrication. De Maria is involved in the technical coordination of the UBORA EU project (GA 731053), Biomembrane (M.ERA-net), and KERAPACK (MANUNET). He is co-founder and president of the FabLab Pisa.

Background: Dr. Josh Sperling is an Urban Futures engineer, project leader, and interdisciplinary senior researcher at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. He is a former Fulbright Scholar, holds a PhD from the Sustainable Urban Infrastructure program at UC-Denver, and has led urban and community science, innovation and incubation thrusts across NREL, U.S. Dept of Energy, State Department, and NSF consortiums and projects. His research combines engineering, planning, policy, and behavioral-decision science approaches to emerging and inclusive technologies and services, energy and related infrastructure systems, and decisions for quality of life and other co-benefits in cities and communities. Recently, Josh has led the co-design of climate, energy, and equity-focused fellowship programs; NREL international partnerships / programs; to research focused on co-designing a net-zero world and incubator network globally. He often emphasizes human-

and empathy-centered approaches and new concepts that may enable ‘leapfrogs’ forward for people, prosperity, and sustainable communities. Urban systems projects have ranged from developing low-carbon, healthy, and resilient cities in the USA, China and India and on ‘Sustainable Cities: People and Infrastructures at the Energy-Water-Climate Nexus’. He’s worked in emerging domains of Peace Engineering, Diplomacy, and has had invitations to the White House, World Energy Forum, MIT Urban Studies & Planning Dept, Future Earth Urban Platform-Working Group, and the U.S. Government Delegation to Habitat III (an every-twenty-years urban innovation global summit hosted by UN Habitat). He’s worked professionally at global firm, ARUP, in New York, San Francisco, Sydney, Melbourne; volunteered for 15+ years with Engineers Without Borders; and contributed as co-lead author to an ‘energy transformations in cities’ chapter of an assessment report including >100 authors, globally.

Background: Dr. Gonzalo Pizarro is the Regional Policy Advisor on SDG Integration for the UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM. He has more than 20 years of experience that combines strategic vision and strong technical expertise. Proven track record effectively influencing governments, civil society, academia and the private sector to develop partnerships, programmes and projects to strengthen capacity and advance the national agenda for development.

Have lead complex and culturally diverse teams, building consensus and partnerships between agencies and donors to garner support for SDGs mandates in multiple countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia. Proven dedication to integrating the social, economic and environmental pillars of sustainable development through policy advise, combined with operational management effectiveness. Excellent interpersonal and communication skills.

Background: Eva Cheng is the Director of Transnational Education, previously the Director of Women in Engineering and IT, and Associate Professor in the School of Professional Practice and Leadership at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Australia. The initiatives within the Women in Engineering and IT program are research-informed and focused on impact, taking a holistic approach to gender equity. With evaluation embedded, Initiatives extend from reaching early audiences in elementary (primary) through to high (secondary) schools, into university studies (undergraduate and

graduate), and connecting into industry careers – all underpinned by building an inclusive, intersectional community. With a background in telecommunications engineering, Eva actively collaborates on social justice and community engagement across STEM diversity and humanitarian engineering, including collaborating with the Tech Girls Movement Foundation, Engineers Without Borders Australia, and as a volunteer with the Timor-Leste Feto Enginhera (Women in Engineering) team and Women in Engineering Pacific and Timor-Leste network

Background: Rachita Misra is the Associate Director (Knowledge and Policy) at SELCO Foundation. She brings in a decade of experience in the development sector, with a primary interest in reducing uneven access to resources and opportunities for the marginalised. Seeing sustainable energy as a means for development, she examines the role of energy in furthering access to livelihood, health and well-being. Her work lies at the

intersection of research, program design and implementation. With SELCO Foundation, over the past 7 years, Rachita has shaped the organization's knowledge management practice that is centered on active collaboration with end users, grassroot practitioners and field teams. Rachita has an Undergraduate degree in Architecture and has done her post graduation from London School of Economics and Political Sciences in Regional and Urban Planning.

Background: Hilmi is a humanitarian shelter and settlements, reconstruction, and DRR specialist with the Humanitarian Policy and Practice team at InterAction – a coalition of 190 US-based NGOs. He works to improve the collaboration, capacity, practice, and policies of stakeholders who respond to humanitarian crises around the world. He is a member of the Strategic Advisory Group of the Global Shelter Cluster and a co-chair of the Urban Settlements Working Group. Prior to joining InterAction, Hilmi worked for U.N. Agencies and NGOs in complex humanitarian emergencies and development programs. He has responded to and managed emergencies such as the conflict and famine in Somalia,

the post-genocide refugee crisis in Tanzania/Rwanda, the Asian tsunami and armed conflict in Sri Lanka, cyclone Sidr in Bangladesh, as well as humanitarian emergencies in Haiti, Eritrea, Pakistan, Yemen, Lebanon, and Sudan. He has also managed several large infrastructure, reconstruction, and refugee resettlement programs in the MENA region. In the private sector, he has worked for Shell Petroleum in Singapore, SAIC in the US, and Nixdorf Informatics in Sri Lanka. Hilmi holds a M.E. in Engineering Project Management Systems from the University of Canterbury, New Zealand and a B.E. in Production Engineering from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka.

Background: Clotilde Rossi di Schio is from Italy, and works as Energy Efficiency Senior Specialist at SEforALL Vienna Office. She works on Energy Efficiency as well as Cooling. Prior to joining SEforALL, Clotilde has been working in the energy sector for more than 12 years as a member of McKinsey’s German office and at Turboden, a Mitsubishi Heavy Industry group company.

As a research assistant with the SIPA Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University, she specialized in decarbonization strategies. Clotilde has an MBA in Finance from Columbia Business School, an MPA in Energy Policy from Columbia SIPA and a Master of Science in Mechanical/Industrial Engineering from Vienna University of Technology.

Background: After a brief stint at Instituto Superior Técnico, in Lisbon, studying Aerospace Engineering, Dr. César Vieira realized that his greatest passion was Healthcare. He decided to change his life and got his MD degree from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Lisbon. Dr. Vieira is an Internal Medicine specialist, with an interest in Intensive Care Medicine. After finishing his residency, he took an Intensive Care Medicine fellowship position at

Centro Hospitalar Universitário de Lisboa Central, Portugal. He has been on the frontline of the COVID-19 response, treating critical COVID-19 patients since the beginning of the pandemic. Dr. Vieira has also served as a WHO technical consultant and is currently an IFMBE Clinical Engineering Division collaborator. Outside his work, he is the proud father of two boys and passionate about wildlife and long treks in the countryside.

Background: David B. Knight is an Associate Professor in the Department of Engineering Education and Special Assistant to the Dean for Strategic Plan Implementation at Virginia Tech. He is also Director of Research of the Academy for Global Engineering at Virginia Tech and is affiliate faculty with the Higher Education Program. His research tends to be at the macro-scale, focused on a systems-level perspective

of how engineering education can become more effective, efficient, and inclusive, tends to leverage large-scale institutional, state, or national data sets, and considers the intersection between policy and organizational contexts. He has B.S., M.S., and M.U.E.P. degrees from the University of Virginia and a Ph.D. in Higher Education from Pennsylvania State University.

Background: Scott Daniel is Senior Lecturer in Humanitarian Engineering. A former high school mathematics and science teacher, he has worked in 10 countries on 5 continents, and as a consultant and facilitator with UNESCO, Australian Volunteers for International Development, Engineers without Borders Australia, Unbound, World Vision, the University of Sydney, the Victorian Department of Education and Training, and the Victorian

Curriculum and Assessment Authority. Previously, he had a regular radio segment as “Dr Scott” on ABC Gippsland, and on ABC Central Victoria, answering listeners’ questions about science. His current research focuses on the development of socio-technical thinking and co-design expertise in the context of humanitarian engineering, and humanitarian engineering education and practice in general.

Background: In the mid 1980s Mike Jensen co-founded The Web in Toronto. It was Canada’s first internet service provider (ISP) for civil society, which subsequently became one of the founding members of the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) in the early 1990s. A South African now residing in Portugal and Brazil, Mike is recognized internationally as a leading expert in digital

infrastructure technology and policy, having advised NGOs, governments and private companies on the deployment of broadband infrastructure in over 45 countries during the last 30 years. In recognition of his contributions to the development of the Internet, he was inducted into the Internet Society's Internet Hall of Fame (IHOF) in 2017.

Background: Dr. Kurt Kornbluth, is an Associate Adjunct Professor in the University of California, Davis Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering (BAE), Academic Director of the Engineering Student Design Center, and the founder and director of Program for International Energy Technology (PIET) and D-Lab. He holds a PhD in Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering from UC Davis and is a Graduate School of Management Business Development fellow. After working for the MIT D-Lab he founded a similar program a UC Davis. In 2008 In 2016 Kornbluth received the University

of California President’s Office Faculty Climate Champion award for his novel client-focused, project–based courses and Sustainable Campus, Sustainable Cities applied research initiative. In 2017 Kurt received the UC Davis Chancellors Global Engagement Award for his efforts to connect students with real projects abroad. In 2019 he was appointed the Academic Director of the new $24M UC Davis Engineering Student Design Center with the charge of incorporating more active learning curricula for Engineering students.

Background: Margaret McCauley is an environmental engineer with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Margaret lives in Seattle where she pedals her children over the hills and through the drizzle. She designed her own major in Urban Ecology at Harvard and has worked as an international negotiator for the U.S. Department of State on

environmental issues. As part of an effort to respond to requests for sanitation assistance from remote communities in Alaska, Margaret created an international research consortium on cold climate anaerobic digestion. She loves collaborating on engineering challenges and getting new ideas from new people.

Background: Patrick Hanemann has been active in the produce business since he joined The Dole Food Company in 1974. Over the years he has lived and worked in the banana plantations of Ecuador and Costa Rica; the citrus groves of California, Arizona and Florida; and the apple, pear and cherry orchards of the Pacific Northwest. He has marketed fresh fruits and vegetables in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the South Pacific.

In 2001 Pat left the private sector and set up Farm2Market Agribusiness Consulting. He now works with groups like the Millennium Challenge Corporation, the US Agency for International Development, the World Bank and the United Nations to improve incomes and opportunities for small and medium farmers around the world.

Background: James Harper is motivated by what can change the world. Trained as an engineer and emergency medical technician, James has extensive experience as a mechanical design engineer, STEM educator, and researcher of how infrastructure and human behavior interact. James' work focuses on two topics: 1) improving public health in rural low-income contexts; and 2) educating and inspiring youth about related topics. He is currently an educator and researcher in Civil Engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder, where he studies how human behavior

affects fecal sludge management in rural Cambodia and Bangladesh. For the past 8 years, James has worked extensively on various infrastructure development projects in rural India. He is a registered Professional Mechanical Engineer and has taught STEM for over 10 years to all age levels. Originally from Gilroy, California, he lived in San Diego, California for many years and now lives in Broomfield, Colorado. Outside of work, he's volunteered extensively for mountain rescue and enjoys hiking and traveling with his partner, Devon, and rescue pit bull, Canela.

Background: Dr. Nathan Johnson is an Associate Professor in The Polytechnic School of the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University. His work translates academic research to deployment for projects in the areas of energy access, grid modernization, microgrids, and critical infrastructure. Dr. Johnson is also an active educator with training and workforce development programs inside

and outside the university. At ASU, Dr. Johnson leads the Laboratory for Energy And Power Solutions (LEAPS) that creates technical and business solutions that facilitate the global transition to a resilient low-carbon economy. Before joining ASU, he worked in product development and business development for the energy sector with projects across 15 countries.

Background: Mustafa Naseem is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Information at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor. Mustafa’s interests lie at the intersection of technology and poverty, and his recent work has focused on the use of information and communication technology (ICT) to improve public service delivery in global health, and water and sanitation (WASH) sectors. Mustafa has taught

and led ICT, design, and entrepreneurship programs in six countries in Africa, Asia and North America, and prior to joining Michigan, Mustafa was the ICTD Expert-in-Residence at the ATLAS Institute, University of Colorado Boulder. He received his Masters Degree from the ATLAS Institute on a Fulbright Scholarship and was shortlisted among 12 finalist Rolex Awards for Enterprise Young Laureates in 2016.

Background: Rebecca Ochong is currently the Senior Manager – Urban Land & Policy for the Asia Pacific region at Habitat for Humanity International where she serves as the key technical specialist in areas of security tenure, housing and land policies and practices. With more than 20 years’ experience in the land and housing sector, she has been instrumental in strengthening security tenure, housing and land policies and practices at national, regional and global levels. She has also co-authored and

contributed to more than 30 publications, articles and conference papers on land governance and property rights. Previously, she worked as a land governance expert at UN-Habitat’s Global Land Tool Network (GLTN) where she was instrumental in developing various land tools as well as building capacity of key government actors and other land stakeholders to improve implementation of innovative, pro-poor and gender responsive land management practices and policies.

Background: Caroline Soyars is the Program Manager and Project Development Lead for the University of Michigan Global Health Design Initiative. Her work focuses on the development and implementation of educational initiatives that train undergraduate engineering and design students to collaborate with diverse stakeholders to identify and define needs and co-develop solutions to address global health challenges. Caroline has also conducted pre-clinical and clinical trials for a wide range of simple low-cost medical devices including 3D printed prosthetic sockets for lower limb

amputees, microendoscopes for endoscopic surveillance of precancerous and cancerous lesions, and most recently, assistive devices for subdermal contraceptive implant insertion and removal. Caroline was first connected to E4C during her internship at the World Health Organization’s Medical Device Unit four years ago and has since supported E4C in various capacities including as a Global Health Fellow, Expert Fellow, Expert Advisor, and 50 Breakthroughs Scientific Translation Committee Lead.

Background: Gabrielle String completed her PhD in Mechanical Engineering evaluating approaches to drinking water provision in developing contexts, including a 4-country evaluation of UNICEF led water safety plan programs for rural community water supply and a study characterizing the pore-network morphology of locally-manufactured ceramic filters. She is currently a postdoctoral scholar in Environmental Health Engineering at Tufts University whose research focuses on filling critical efficacy and effectiveness evidence gaps in water and hygiene programs implemented in humanitarian response. In conjunction with donors and implementing partners, she has

conducted multi-country, mixed-methods field evaluations of emergency water treatment programs including bucket chlorination. In the laboratory her research includes evaluation of novel household water filters, disinfection efficacy of chlorine against cholera bacteria on surfaces common to low-resource households and healthcare facilities, and evaluations of locally-available cleaning agents to inhibit biofilm development and/or to clean biofilms from tap and water storage container surfaces. Her roots in engineering for development started during her undergraduate career leading an Engineers Without Borders team assisting a ceramic filter manufacturing facility in Ecuador.

Background: Mr. Tali Trigg has a Master of Environmental Management and a Bachelor of Political Science, with over 12 years of experience working in climate change and sustainable transport and energy. His work has focused on transport and climate change across all continents, including collaboration with the private sector down to city-level implementation. Mr. Trigg currently works as an international consultant working on sustainable transport with a focus on climate change policy, including for example adaptation concerns relating to an ADB electric bus project in Indonesia, strengthening SOURCE software for use by climate finance developers including climate and adaptation concerns, as well as working as lead consultant for GIZ in Latin America and Cape Verde on projects relating to climate-resilient electric mobility proposals. He has supported the development of electric mobility plans and strategies including technological assistance for vehicle electrification in Colombia and Uruguay. Prior to working as a consultant, Mr. Trigg worked for GIZ (2015-2018) as the Project Director of its Transport and Climate Change project, a partnership with ASEAN, based in Bangkok,

Thailand. His work focused on fuel economy, green freight, Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions and Measurement, Reporting and Verification. Furthermore, he supported ASEAN countries to develop national action plans on sustainable transport including considerations of adaptation and climate resiliency, as well as engaging with the ASEAN Secretariat and its Working Groups to develop and implement an over-arching transport plan for the region. Previously, Mr. Trigg worked at the International Energy Agency (IEA) as an Energy Analyst between 2010-2015. At the IEA, he conducted energy modelling, technology policy analysis (lead author of Energy Technology Perspectives 2014). At the IEA he spearheaded its efforts on the intergovernmental Electric Vehicles Initiative (EVI) working on data collection and research collaboration, culminating in the EV City Casebook and more recently the Global EV Outlook. Prior to IEA, he worked as a research associate for the Center on Globalization, Governance & Competitiveness (CGGC) conducting value chain analyses focusing on the cleantech sector, including a study on lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles. He is a native of Sweden.