Executive Director

Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology, Director of the Interdisciplinary Cooperation Initative at ASU, and author of The Cheating Cell and A Field Guide to the Apocalypse. Aktipis studies cooperation, conflict, and decision-making across systems. As the founding director of CFI, she draws on decades of research in cooperation science and a career devoted to public engagement, from creating the Zombified Podcast and The Apocalypse Roadshow to writing books and articles that bring cooperation science to wider audiences.

Director of Global Engagement

Scientia Professor of Evolution at UNSW Sydney. Brooks studies the tensions between conflict and cooperation in social living and sexual reproduction. He also studies how modern technologies engage with evolved human behaviours. His latest book, Artificial Intimacy, considers what happens when technology collides with evolved capacities to form friendships, become intimate, and cooperate. He is the recipient of the Eureka Prize and the Queensland Literary Award for Sex, Genes and Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Director of Education & Academic Partnerships

Distinguished Professor of Anthropology at Rutgers University and author of Meeting at Grand Central: Understanding the Social and Evolutionary Roots of Cooperation. Cronk studies cooperation and cultural evolution, with a focus on how people share resources and solve collective problems. He has pinoeered interactive teaching tools and curriculum for cooperation science education. At CFI, he leads efforts to expand education, training, and academic collaborations in cooperation science.

Director of Startup Ecosystems & Emerging Technology

MIT researcher, serial entrepreneur, and Director of Executive Education at the Society for Multidisciplinary Fundamental Research, whose work has shaped early concepts in collaborative legal ownership and cryptocurrency architectures. His current research, conducted with Michael Levin, focuses on integrating insights across disciplines to address complex challenges in health and the material sciences. He brings deep experience at the intersection of emerging technologies, decentralized systems, and scientific innovation.

Director of Biological Systems

President's Professor in the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University. Fewell studies how social interactions and selection influence cooperative behavior and the role of self-organization in the transition to group living. She is an expert on biological complex systems, specializing on decentralized cooperation and division of labor, particularly how division of work emerges and scales within social groups, from harvester ants to other species.

Executive in Residence,

Cooperative Futures Venture Studio

Past Section Head of America’s Seed Fund at the U.S. National Science Foundation and a multi-industry C-suite executive and entrepreneur. At CFI, Timm-Brock works with founders and leadership teams to advance growth, strengthen venture readiness, and shape the institute’s emerging venture platform.

Director of Human–Technology Systems

Provost Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and author of Simple Heuristics that Make Us Smart and Ecological Rationality: Intelligence in the World. Todd studies cooperation, decision-making, and how people think about the future, guiding CFI’s work on building adaptive, cooperative human–technology systems.

Director of Intergenerational Transmission & Cultural Systems

Distinguished Professor of Anthropology at The University of Utah and Arizona State University. She is a member of The National Academy of Sciences. Weissner has studied the role of technology in social and cultural change in small-scale societies, from the role of firelight to social media. She founded the Tradition and Transition Centre in Papua New Guinea to preserve and transmit Enga culture to the next generation.

Christine Peterson is Cofounder and Senior Fellow of Foresight Institute. She is co-author of Unbounding the Future: the Nanotechnology Revolution; Leaping the Abyss: Putting Group Genius to Work; and Gaming the Future: Technologies for Intelligent Voluntary Cooperation. She coined the term ‘open source software’. She holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from MIT.

Andrew Maynard is a scientist, writer, and Professor at Arizona State University, where he directs the Future of Being Human initiative. With a background in physics, public health, and technology policy, he bridges disciplines to explore how innovation can serve society more effectively. Andrew is the author of Films from the Future and Future Rising, a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a passionate advocate for making knowledge accessible to all.

David Sloan Wilson is president of ProSocial World and SUNY Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Biology and Anthropology at Binghamton University. He applies evolutionary theory to all aspects of humanity in addition to the rest of life, through ProSocial World and in his own research and writing. His most recent books include his first novel, Atlas Hugged: The Autobiography of John Galt III, and a memoir, A Life Informed by Evolution.

Adam is the Co-founder, Chairman, and Head of Research for Softmax, a technology company focused on utilizing principles of organic alignment from evolutionary biology to solve problems of alignment in technological systems. Previously, he co-founded Hipmunk and was a visiting Scientist working on cancer research at the Levin Lab at Tufts. He holds bachelors degrees in Mechanical Engineering and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.

Gary Dirks is senior director, Global Futures Laboratory, and director of LightWorks®, an Arizona State University initiative that capitalizes on ASU's strengths in solar energy and other light-inspired research. He is also the Julie Wrigley Chair of Sustainable Practices, professor of practice in the School of Sustainability, and distinguished sustainability scientist. From 2013-2019, he was the director of ASU's Wrigley Institute. Before joining ASU, Professor Dirks was the president of British Petroleum Asia-Pacific and the president of British Petroleum China.

Nichol Bradford is a futurist, investor, and executive advisor shaping how humans and intelligent technologies thrive together. As SHRM’s AI + HI Executive-in-Residence, she contributes to global strategies influencing 362 million workers and their families through 340,000 HR professionals across 180 countries. She reaches 100,000+ people annually through speaking and writing, and invests in technologies that strengthen Human vitality, performance, and society. Nichol is the founder of Human+Tech Week, a global platform advancing human-centered AI, and Co-founder at Niremia Collective, a venture fund for longevity, peak performance, and human flourishing.

Chief of Staff

Cristina Baciu is an educational leadership specialist with deep expertise in mentoring, research development, and academic–industry partnerships. She is the founder of MentorMind Consulting and has held key administrative and research leadership roles at Arizona State University, including Assistant Director of Research at the W. P. Carey School of Business and Research Program Manager for major NIH-funded initiatives. At CFI, she leads organization-wide strategy and execution, forging powerful cross-sector partnerships and building the systems that enable the institute to grow, innovate, and sustain its impact.

Director of Research Partnerships & Digital Scholarship

Liz Grumbach is a digital humanities scholar and research manager whose work focuses on ethical technological innovation, digital public humanities, and culturally responsible data practices. As Program Manager for Digital Humanities and Research at ASU’s Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, she leads collaborative projects and cultivates interdisciplinary research communities, and she serves on the Board of Directors for Digital Frontiers. At CFI, she builds and coordinates research partnerships across universities, strengthening connections with ASU’s Interdisciplinary Cooperation Initiative and other academic programs to advance cooperative, cross-sector innovation.

Director of Creative Ecosystem Design

Pamela Winfrey is an experienced facilitator who helps groups, organizations, and institutions surface shared goals, navigate differences productively, and use art and embodied inquiry to create environments that spark curiosity, connection, and new perspectives. She brings decades of experience at the intersection of art, science, and technology, beginning with her long tenure as a senior artist at the Exploratorium in San Francisco and continuing as Director of the Cancer Arts Program at ASU’s Arizona Cancer Evolution Center. She is also an author, playwright and director.

Graduate Student Researcher

Gissel is a PhD candidate in Evolutionary Biology at Arizona State University. Her research examines microbial cooperation and conflict across systems ranging from cancer biology to fermentation ecosystems. She runs the Kombucha Lab at ASU, exploring how this multi-species ecosystem resists invasion through decentralized cooperative mechanisms.

Graduate Student Researcher

Bernardo is a PhD candidate in Psychology at Arizona State University. His research explores the evolution of emotions and cooperation in humans and other systems. He is developing benchmarks for measuring trust in AI systems.

Graduate Student Researcher

Scout Elise Mastick is a graduate student at Arizona State University whose research focuses on large-scale patterns of multi-agent collective behavior across systems, from insects to humans to artificial intelligences. Beyond that, Scout investigates the unique role rhythmic entrainment occupies in the execution of these collective processes, and how artificial intelligence systems understand their creative and strategic relationship with humans. She is developing a division of labor benchmark for AI systems.

Graduate Student Researcher
Philip Arthur is a graduate student researcher and entrepreneur, focused on the intersection of finance and philosophy and applications in risk management. He combines experience as a futures and options trader in New York with degrees in Economics and Philosophy from Davidson College and Arizona State University to investigate how we can benefit from good “fat tails” and avoid bad ones. He currently works with CFI as a researcher and as a board member at co-working space Centrl Office, developing insights on how cooperation can help individuals and institutions better manage risk and promote well-being.

Junior Project Manager

Reilly Donovan is a Junior Project Manager at the Cooperative Futures Institute, where he works on research exploring cooperation between humans and artificial intelligence systems. He has overseen the development of multiple benchmarks evaluating cooperative behavior in large language models and independently designed a benchmark studying how alliances form between humans and AI agents in group settings.

Associated Researcher

Vivek is a postdoctoral researcher cross appointed between the Booth School of Business and the Pritzker School of Medicine at the University of Chicago. He applies frontier econometric and computational AI tools to map the metabolic topology of the gut-liver-brain axis. By modeling this network as a complex dynamic system, he demonstrates how modern diets—stripped of protective bacterial metabolites—disrupt evolutionarily conserved pathways to trigger the neuro-metabolic feedback loops driving metabolic disease, IBS, and addiction.

Director of Financial Operations

Karen Alexander has nearly 25 years of experience providing trusted bookkeeping and financial organization services for both individuals and businesses. At CFI, she oversees financial operations and administrative coordination, supporting the organization’s stability, transparency, and long-term strategic planning.

Marketing & Social Media Manager

Dakota Jeane DiSanto is the founder of The Social Media Manager, a boutique agency she launched in 2021 to help brands authentically and organically grow through thoughtful strategy, compelling content, and strong digital storytelling. With over 13 years of experience in digital marketing, Dakota began her career in social media in 2013 while serving as Retail Director for DASH, the Kardashian-owned retail brand.

Consultant for Human-AI Systems

Saina Taidi held global program leadership roles at companies such as Estée Lauder and Purdue Pharma, where she built and led PMOs and drove large-scale supply chain and enterprise transformation initiatives across complex, cross-functional environments. She is currently an independent consultant and collaborator, working at the intersection of organizational change and emerging technologies, exploring how artificial intelligence is reshaping coordination and decision-making inside complex systems.