Steven Chu will present the keynote address at the Tenth Technology Innovation Forum: “U.S. National Laboratories as Engines for Innovation.” Government research laboratories are a great national resource for technology innovation and development. The forum explores the opportunities and challenges in how best to utilize government labs for bringing new materials technologies to market. Through a series of talks and panel discussions, it will examine case studies from around the world and highlight best practices that are viable.

Chu is the William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Physics and Professor of Molecular and Cellular Physiology in the medical school at Stanford University. He has published 260 papers in atomic and polymer physics, biophysics, biology, biomedicine and batteries, and holds 10 patents. Chu was the 12th US Secretary of Energy from January 2009 until the end of April 2013. As the first scientist to hold a Cabinet position and the longest serving energy secretary, he recruited outstanding scientists and engineers into the Department of Energy. He began several initiatives, including ARPA-E (Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy), the Energy Innovation Hubs, and the US–China Clean Energy Research Center (CERC). Chu has numerous awards, including the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics shared with Claude Cohen-Tannoudji and William D. Phillips, and he holds 26 honorary degrees.

For more information about the Technology Innovation Forum X, visit www.mrs.org/spring-2016-technology-innovation-forum.