Summer Enrichment Series #3: Enriching Uranium with Lasers

Panelist Biographies:

Ms. Ruth Smith
Ruth Ravitz Smith joined GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) in January 2010 to lead the company’s government relations activities around the globe. GEH is a global nuclear alliance created by GE and Hitachi in 2007 to serve the nuclear industry. Ms. Smith’s career spans nearly thirty years in both the public and private sectors. Prior to joining GEH, Smith held government relations positions with Alstom, Brown Rudnick, The Travelers Company, Northeast Utilities System, and the Aerospace Industries Association. Smith’s public service included representing the State of Connecticut and working on the staff in the U.S. House of Representatives. Ms. Smith earned a B.A. from Hood College in Frederick, Maryland and a M.B.A. from Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia. She is based In Washington, DC.

Dr. Francis Slakey
Francis Slakey is a PhD physicist and the Associate Director of Public Affairs for the American Physical Society where he oversees APS legislative activities, specializing in energy and security policy.   He is also The Upjohn Lecturer on Physics and Public Policy and the Co-Director of the Program on Science in the Public Interest at Georgetown University.  He is a Fellow of the APS, a Fellow of the AAAS, a MacArthur Scholar, and a Lemelson Research Associate of the Smithsonian Institution.  In 2009, he became the first person in history to both summit the highest mountain on every continent and surf every ocean.  His best-selling adventure memoir, To The Last Breath, was recently selected as an Amazon "Best Book of the Month", an Entertainment Weekly "Must Read", and has been praised by Vanity Fair, the New York Times, and others.

Dr. Olli Heinonen
Before joining the Belfer Center as a senior fellow in August 2010, Olli Heinonen spent 27 years at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, serving as Deputy Director General of the IAEA, and head of the Department of Safeguards.  He led the Agency's efforts to identify and dismantle nuclear proliferation networks, including the one led by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan, and oversaw its efforts to monitor and contain Iran's nuclear program.  Heinonen has led teams of international investigators to examine nuclear programs of concern around the world. A native of Finland, he studied radiochemistry and completed his Ph.D dissertation in nuclear material analysis at the University of Helsinki.

Moderator:

Sharon Squassoni
Sharon Squassoni is a senior fellow and director of the Proliferation Prevention Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).  She joined CSIS from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where she authored Nuclear Energy: Rebirth or Resuscitation? (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2009).  Her work focuses on policies to reduce nuclear risks, whether in nuclear security, nuclear energy or nuclear weapons.  Ms. Squassoni has advised Congress as a senior specialist in weapons of mass destruction at the Congressional Research Service and has held policy positions in the State Department and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.