Current Fellows

Daniel Affsprung

Dan Affsprung is a PhD candidate in History and Philosophy of Science at Arizona State University. He is a Fellow in the Program on Science, Technology and Society at Harvard Kennedy School and a research assistant for the Global Observatory for Genome Editing. Dan's research examines the ways scientific and technical expertise are used to support and regulate social and political functioning by defining conditions that enable individuals to act with autonomy and produce collective benefit. He studies the history of Cold War social and interdisciplinary science and the regulation of emerging technology.

Henry Austin

Henry Austin is a Research Associate with the Global Observatory for Genome Editing and a Fellow in the STS program. Henry holds an A.B. from Harvard College where he studied Social Studies with a Secondary Field in Computer Science before graduating in 2023.

Nicole West Bassoff

Nicole West Bassoff is a PhD candidate in Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School, where she is also a Fellow in the Program on Science, Technology and Society. She uses the disciplinary approach of Science and Technology Studies (STS) to examine the ethics and politics of technology-driven urban development projects in the U.S. Through a comparative study of controversies surrounding “smart city” projects, her dissertation interrogates the social compact between cities and citizens in the digital age. She explores how the rights and duties of citizens are reformulated when cities are transformed through private investment and technological innovation.

Elena Bernardi

Elena Bernardi is a Master in Public Affairs student at Brown University, and Director’s Fellow for the Military Fellows Program at the Watson Institute for Public and International Affairs. In the last several years, she has worked in international development, risk-assessment, and countering violent extremism. Her interests are at the intersection of public opinion, security, and political language.

Akshay Bhambri

Akshay Bhambri is a distinguished ICS-Harvard-Yenching Doctoral Fellow currently pursuing doctoral research on the theme 'After the Revolution, After Colonialism: A Comparative Study of the Politics of Medical Knowledge in China and India.' He was also a Visiting Research Fellow at the Peking University in Beijing. Previously, he dedicated considerable time to research and Mandarin language acquisition at the National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei.

Keaton Boyle

Keaton Boyle is a PhD student in Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School on the Science, Technology, and Policy Studies track. He is interested in using the tools and sensibilities of STS to explore interactions between digital technology and legal theory, especially at points where the law draws boundaries between political and economic spheres.

Katie Burstein

Katie Burstein is a senior at Harvard College, where she studies the History of Science and Classics. Her research focuses on the reception of medical healing and patient identity in the ancient world, as well as their influence on the formation of the (body) politic. She is interested in the development of modern bioethics, and contemporary controversies in emerging biotechnologies as they relate to the formation of patient identities — particularly aspects of visualization and representation in medical imaging.

Lou Lennad

Lou Lennad is a PhD student in Public Policy on the Science, Technology and Policy Studies track at Harvard Kennedy School. Her research explores the contemporary ways in which the European Union articulates epistemic and democratic registers of legitimation when producing governance. Her dissertation will investigate ethnographically the institutional and discursive constructions of EU ‘evidence-based policy’.

Oliwia Mandrela

Oliwia Mandrela is a PhD candidate in Sociology at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. Her research explores visions of futures linked to the development of longevity biotechnology in the US and China. The aim is to better understand what futures of age manipulation are being imagined and by whom. She also examines how knowledge is produced and justified in this field, what hopes, fears, risk, and uncertainties are reflected, and what changes in our understanding of biological life may emerge from this field.

Conor McGlynn

Conor McGlynn is a PhD student in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. He was a 2020-2021 Fulbright Scholar at the Wilson Center in Washington D.C. and a 2019-2020 Schwarzman Scholar at Tsinghua University in Beijing and previously worked in EU affairs in Brussels. He holds degrees in philosophy and economics from the University of Cambridge and Trinity College Dublin.

Pariroo Rattan

Pariroo Rattan is a PhD candidate in the Science, Technology and Policy Studies (STePS) track in Public Policy program at Harvard, and is doing a secondary field in Music alongside her doctoral degree. She is a Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Program on Science, Technology and Society (STS). Her doctoral work studies the moral politics of the digital economy and the rise of populism in India, where she conducts ethnography on the adoption of digital biometrics and payment systems by street vendors.

Hilton Simmet

Hilton Simmet is a Ph.D. candidate in Public Policy and a graduate research associate with the Program on Science, Technology and Society at Harvard Kennedy School. His research uses the methods of Science and Technology Studies (STS) and political theory to examine the constitutive role that scientific knowledge plays in addressing questions of public policy.

Andrew Stokols

Andrew is a Lecturer in the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning. His research interests bridge political economy, history, urban design, and science and technology studies. Having lived in China, Singapore, and South Korea, he became interested in how historical legacies of state-led industrialization shape current approaches to urbanization and development in the region.

Justin Wong

Justin Wong is a PhD student in Science, Technology and Policy Studies at the Harvard Kennedy School, as well as a JD student in Harvard Law School. His current research interests surround national framings of science and technology within global orders: how ideas of national interests and security are naturalised, how global orders are constructed, and how notions of ownership and sovereignty are stabilised and contested on national and international levels. His doctoral research seeks to engage China through a comparative lens, bringing together aspects of STS, law, IR, and East Asian studies.