In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized (subject to certain rules and regulations).

Zellerbach Hall
101 Zellerbach Hall #4800
University of California
Berkeley, California, 94720
United States

Aimee Allison

Aimee Allison is the founder and president of She the People, a national network elevating the political voice and power of women of color. By bringing together the nation’s top women of color candidates, strategists, and movement leaders, Ms. Allison was one of the primary architects for the electoral successes in 2018 that made it the "year of women of color in politics." In April 2019, she convened the first presidential forum for women of color, reaching a quarter of the American population on social media and inspiring thousands of articles and news segments. She was featured in Politico’s 2019 Powerlist. In the early 1990’s, Ms. Allison was one of the first women of color to be honorably discharged from the U.S. Army as a conscientious objector and works today to support courageous, moral leadership. Author of Army of None, she has written for the New York Times, The Hill, Teen Vouge and ESSENCE Magazine and has appeared in hundreds of outlets including MSNBC, CNN, the Washington Post, Associated Press and PBS.

Asher Jay

Asher Jay (@EarthHeiress) is an international adventurer and public figure whose compelling paintings, sculptures, installations, animations, ad campaigns, and films all have a single purpose: to incite global action on behalf of wildlife conservation. Jay just opened two permanent exhibits at National Geographic Encounter in New York's Times Square — a large scale wall-mounted installation entitled Piece of the Planet, and an immersive, soundscaped installation called "Message in a Bottle."

Atiaf Alwazir

Atiaf Z. Alwazir was born in Sana’a, spent her childhood in Beirut and Jeddah, and as a teenager settled in the Washington D.C. Metropolitan area. She currently lives in Brussels where she is a research consultant by day and writer by night, with extensive knowledge of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), focusing on gender, human rights and the intersection of Art and politics. She has worked in non-governmental organizations and research institutions in Washington D.C., Cairo, Sana'a, Tunis, Beirut, Berlin, Lille and Brussels and carries each city with her, making her identify as a world citizen. In 2011, she actively participated in the Yemeni Revolution, documented the events on her blog and co-founded SupportYemen, a storytelling collective. Her articles have been published in several outlets including the Guardian, Foreign Policy, openDemocracy, Fair Observer, and Al-Jazeera English. She is the co-author of Change Square, a photo book on Yemen’s revolution.

Carolyn Porco

Carolyn Porco is a planetary explorer & scientist known for her work on the Voyager mission during the 1980s and as the leader of the imaging team on the now-completed Cassini mission at Saturn. She has co-authored more than 125 scientific papers on a variety of subjects in planetary science and astronomy. Carolyn played instrumental roles in the taking of three iconic photographs of planet Earth from the outer solar system, including the 1990 Pale Blue Dot image of Earth taken by the Voyager 1 spacecraft, and the Day the Earth Smiled event, in which she invited the people of the world to ‘smile’ during the July 19, 2013 imaging of Earth from the Cassini spacecraft. She has won numerous honors for her contributions to science and the public sphere. In 1999, she was selected by the London Sunday Times as one of 18 scientific leaders of the 21st century. In 2012, she was named one of the 25 most influential people in space by Time magazine. In 2018, she was the inaugural recipient of National Geographic’s Eliza Scidmore Award for Outstanding Science Media. She was the character consultant on the 1997 film Contact, based on Carl Sagan’s novel, and the science consultant on Paramount Pictures’ 2009 reboot of Star Trek. She is a Visiting Scholar at UC Berkeley and a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences.

Emily Levesque

Astronomer

Erika Cheung

Erika Cheung (UC Berkeley Class of 2013) was one of the key whistleblowers in the Theranos scandal that stopped the company from processing thousands of patients samples with faulty technology. The story has been covered in the book Bad Blood by John Carreyrou, 60 minutes, ABC news, and recently the HBO documentary The Inventor: Out for Blood in the Silicon Valley. After working for biotechnology companies, she committed herself to growing the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Hong Kong and throughout Asia. She was the founding team member of the Betatron, a startup accelerator based in Hong Kong. She works as a venture partner for two Asia-based VC firms focused on Health Tech & Biotechnology investments. Currently, she is launching a new non-profit, Ethics in Entrepreneurship: a movement aimed at fostering ethical culture within startup ecosystems. EIE acts as the connective tissues between tools, resources, and experts to implement ethics into the core of their businesses.

Fifer Garbesi

Fifer Garbesi is an immersive media producer and director with content screening at Cannes, Tribeca, and The Nobel Peace Prize. Her work uses emerging technology to explore topics such as the Cuban embargo, child marriage, nuclear weapons testings, and the evolution of Brain-Computer Interfaces. At the crossroads of technology and entertainment, she advocates for digital wellbeing, democratized media, and foresight in technological development.

Gary Muszynski and the Roots and Wings Ensemble

Gary Muszynski and the Roots and Wings Ensemble: Gary Muszynski is a percussionist, composer, and educator who focuses on world fusion, especially the the sounds and rhythms of Brazil, Africa, Cuba, Peru, and India, combined with the sounds of nature. He has performed his original music at venues such as the Freight and Salvage, SFJAZZ (with Bobby McFerrin), and the Country Music Hall of Fame. Northern California native Frank Martin continues a career as a pianist and keyboard player that has found him performing with artists like Lady Gaga, Stevie Winwood, Madonna, Stevie Wonder, Chris Isaak, Elton John, and Bruce Springsteen. Suellen Primost, seasoned cellist, has played for films Win.Lose.Forgive and Do I Sound Gay?, at SAND Conferences, and with jazz greats Herbie Hancock, Jeff Oster, and John Santos. Dianne Zellers has performed gospel in the Los Angeles area, jazz in France, Funk and Blues with bands in the Bay Area and World Groove with East Bay artists. Dianne’s soulful contemporary style has been charming audiences for decades.

Grant Sanderson

Grant Sanderson (@3blue1brown) is the founder of the math outreach and education YouTube channel 3blue1brown, which has over two million subscribers and over 85 million total views. He’s collaborated with many other online educators, such as MinutePhysics, Smarter Every day, Ben Eater and more. The topics covered on the channel range from pure math, like prime numbers and strange occurrences of pi, to more applied topics, like neural networks, physics, and how cryptocurrencies work, and from topics commonly seen in school, like calculus, to ones outside a traditional curriculum, like fractal dimension.

Homayoun Sakhi

Homayoun Sakhi is a World Class Artist of the Rubab, an Afghan Folk Instrument. He has been deemed as the Most Innovative Rubab Artist of his time. His performance style has been shaped not only by the musical traditions to which Afghan music is geographically and historically linked, but by his lively interest in contemporary music from around the world. His artistry demonstrates how an imaginative musician working within a traditional musical idiom can enrich and expand its expressive power while respecting the taste and sensibility passed down from master musicians of the past. His exceptional talent and unswerving dedication to his art have brought him success on the concert stage, and he maintains an active performance schedule that takes him to cities around the world and has performed in front of Numerous Royal Families, Dignitaries, Heads of State and world Recognized Religious Leaders.

Leila Salazar-Lopez

Leila Salazar-Lopez is a mother; proud Chicana-Latina woman; and passionate defender of Mother Earth, the Amazon, indigenous rights and climate justice. Since 2015, she has served as the Executive Director of Amazon Watch, leading the organization in its work to protect and defend the bio-cultural and climate integrity of the Amazon rainforest by advancing indigenous peoples' rights, territories, and solutions, including solar for energy, communications and transport in the Amazon. For 20+ years Leila has worked to defend the world's rainforests, human rights, and the climate through grassroots organizing and international advocacy campaigns at Amazon Watch, Rainforest Action Network, Global Exchange, and Green Corps. She is currently a Greenpeace Voting Member and a Global Fund for Women Advisor for Latin America. She was recently acknowledged in Make it Better Media’s "17 Bay Area Environmentalists Making a Difference."

Leyla Kabuli

Leyla Kabuli is a third-year student at UC Berkeley, studying Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and Music. She graduated from the Pre-College Division of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music in 2017, and was the keyboardist of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra from 2015 to 2019. Her piano awards include three National YoungArts Awards, the American Prize in Piano Concerto, the US Chopin Foundation scholarship, and top prizes in international competitions. She was featured on NPR’s From the Top, and has performed at venues including Kennedy Center and Carnegie Hall. As a soloist and active chamber musician, she frequently participates in benefit and outreach performances in California and around the country.

Matthias Giraud

Matthias "Super Frenchie" Giraud is a world record-holding big mountain skier and BASE jumper, known for combining both sports. He has completed many first descents and ski BASE jumps across the globe and he is the only person to have ski BASE jumped the reknowned Alps trilogy: Eiger, Matterhorn and Mont Blanc. Matthias’ exploits have been featured on media around the world, including 60 Minutes, Good Morning America, CNN and some of GoPro’s most successful viral videos.He has been a correspondent for NBC Universal, Men’s Journal and performed stunts for Apple and Facebook.

Natya at Berkeley

Natya at Berkeley is the premier Bharatanatyam team at UC Berkeley. Founded in Spring 2013, Natya aims to cultivate artistic talent and cultural awareness within the community by performing locally and competing in the national intercollegiate classical circuit.

Nisha Anand

Nisha Anand is the CEO of Dream Corps, a nonprofit organization that brings people together across racial, social and partisan lines to solve our toughest problems. With her team of storytellers, organizers, and policy experts, Nisha works at the intersection of criminal justice reform, green economics and tech equity to create a better future for all. Previously, Nisha served as Chief of Staff to Van Jones, CNN commentator and NY Times Bestselling Author.

Rabby Yang

Rabby Yang is one of the youngest magicians to fool master magicians Penn & Teller on the national TV show Fool Us. His performance received millions of views worldwide. In addition to TV appearances, Rabby has won numerous international competitions. With over 15 years of experience, he incorporates showmanship and audience interaction with innovation and technical skills to form his personal approach to magic. After watching Rabby perform, actor Jack Black described Rabby as "poetic." In recognition of Rabby's "superior development and achievements in the performance of stage manipulation," The Academy of Magical Arts awarded Rabby the Junior Achievement Award in 2019. Aside from performing, Rabby has also been a teacher of magic at UC Berkeley for 3 years. His course focuses on the performance and psychological theories behind magic and the art of deception. Rabby believes these theories are applicable beyond the stage and can be valuable in design innovation in multiple industries. Currently, Rabby is the vice-chairman of IACM, a non-profit organization that provides leadership in Chinese magic by gathering resources and connecting Chinese magicians from all over the world for the purpose of advancing the magical arts.

Rajesh Rao

Rajesh P.N. Rao is the CJ and Elizabeth Hwang Professor of Computer Science and Engineering and Electrical Engineering, and co-Director of the Center for Neurotechnology at the University of Washington. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Fulbright Scholar award, an NSF CAREER award, a Young Investigator Award from the Office of Naval Research, a Sloan Faculty Fellowship, and a Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering. He is the author of the book Brain-Computer Interfacing (Cambridge University Press, 2013) and the co-editor of two volumes, Probabilistic Models of the Brain (MIT Press, 2002) and Bayesian Brain (MIT Press, 2007). His research spans the areas of computational neuroscience, AI, and brain-computer interfacing. Prof. Rao and his collaborators were the first to demonstrate direct brain control of a humanoid robot in 2007 and direct brain-to-brain communication in humans in 2013. With Prof. Adrienne Fairhall, he offered the first MOOC (massively open online course) in computational neuroscience on Coursera. Prof. Rao's other passions include classical Indian paintings and the 4000-year-old undeciphered Indus script, a topic on which he has given a TED talk.

Raquel Bono

Vice Admiral Raquel C. Bono, MD, MBA, FACS, served with honor and distinction for nearly 30 years becoming the first woman surgeon in the military to hold the rank of Vice Admiral (3-stars). As the former chief executive officer (CEO) and director of Defense Health Agency (DHA), a $50B/year health enterprise, Vice Admiral (Dr.) Bono led a joint, integrated combat support agency to provide health care services across all the military services to over 9.5 million members. A board-certified trauma surgeon, Dr. Bono is an inspiration and role model for all surgeons, especially women surgeons across the country and in the military. Her honors include: American College of Surgeons Mary Edwards Walker Inspiring Women in Surgery Award (2019); Federal IT Women in Leadership Lifetime Achievement Award (2019); Modern Healthcare’s 50 Most Influential Clinical Executive Leaders (2019); 50 Most Influential Healthcare Physician Executives and Leaders (2018) and 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare (2018).

SOL Development

SOL Development (Source of Light) mirrors Nina Simone’s quintessential words: an artist’s duty is to reflect the times. The band offers music to illuminate today’s cultural and political climate, matching it with a sound that allows the listener to feel empowered in finding their own activism and healing. Audiences who have witnessed their dynamic live performance include SXSW, Broccoli City Festival, Black Joy Parade, Blue Note NYC, Stern Grove Festival, Oakland Museum of California, Global Climate Summit, HATCH and Blackout for Human Rights: MLK Now. They have shared the stage with Yasiin Bey, Common, Yo-Yo Ma, Masego, India Arie, GZA, Jidenna, Femi Kuti and many more.

Sophia Yen

Sophia Yen, M.D., M.P.H. is the CEO and Co-Founder of PandiaHealth.com, a birth control delivery, a digital health startup providing convenient, confidential, and reliable access to healthcare via telemedicine and medication delivery, starting with birth control. She has a passion for making women’s lives easier and preventing unplanned pregnancies. Dr. Yen graduated from MIT, UCSF Medical School, and UC Berkeley’s MPH program. With 20+ years in medicine, she serves as a Clinical Associate Professor at Stanford Medical School and on the Executive Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics’s Section On Adolescent Health. She focuses on Reproductive Health and co-founded 2 non-profit projects to improve the lives of women: The Silver Ribbon Campaign to Trust Women and SheHeroes.org. Pandia Health is the ONLY #WomenFounded #WomenLed #DoctorFounded/Led birth control delivery company. She was named one of the Top Women Entrepreneurs to Watch in 2017 by Bustle.

Steve Horvath

Steve Horvath is a professor of human genetics and biostatistics at the University of California, Los Angeles. Horvath had a lifelong interest in solving an important problem in aging research: how do we measure aging? In 2011 Horvath and his collaborators at UCLA described the first age estimation method (epigenetic clock) for saliva based on chemical modifications of the DNA molecule known as DNA methylation. Two years later Horvath published an age estimator that applies to all tissues and cells of the human body. This discovery, known as the Horvath epigenetic clock, was unexpected because cells differ greatly in terms of their epigenetic patterns. Recently, he has studied treatments that slow or even reverse aging in humans. He and his colleagues have demonstrated that the epigenetic clock predicts lifespan and is related to centenarian status, obesity, HIV infection, early menopause, progeria, and many other age related conditions.