Discover TED’s
remarkable speakers

Eye surgeon Andrew Bastawrous is cofounder and CEO of Peek Vision, a social impact organization whose smartphone app brings quality eye care to remote communities and helps people avoid losing their sight to curable or preventable conditions. Voted "best social-impact start-up in Europe" by Google and McKinsey in 2016, the app, Peak Acuity, is being used to transform eye health in more than 150 countries.

In 2018, Bastawrous was invited to deliver the Commonwealth Address in the presence of the British Royal Family, where he announced the creation of a new one-billion-dollar Vision Catalyst Fund -- a new vision for international aid.

Anjan Sundaram has spent the last decade writing about 21st century dictatorships, forgotten conflicts and discrimination around the world – from the Democratic Republic of Congo to Rwanda and India. He is the author of Bad News: Last Journalists in a Dictatorship (Ingabire prize, PEN America prize finalist, Amazon Best Book of 2016) and Stringer: A Reporter's Journey in the Congo (Royal African Society Book of the Year in 2014, BBC Book of the Week). His writing has appeared in Granta, The New York Review of Books, the New York Times, The Guardian and Foreign Policy. His war correspondence won a Frontline Club award in 2015 and a Reuters prize in 2006. Sundaram is a TED Fellow. He graduated from Yale University.

An art school student turned Antarctic explorer and NASA advisor, Ariel Waldman helps people understand science through her fun and creative lens. Her YouTube channel features her science adventures around the globe, exploring the intersections between science fiction, space exploration and pop culture. As global director of Science Hack Day, she’s grown the event to span 30 countries, and she was recognized by the Obama White House as a Champion of Change. She loves creating imaginative projects that explore the world below our feet and beyond our atmosphere, making science fun and accessible to everyone.

“A good planet is hard to find,” says Betül Kaçar. She should know. As lead scientist of a NASA astrobiology research center focusing on molecular paleobiology, she explores alien planets and ancient DNA to understand the “recipe of life.” Inviting us to imagine life on other planets, she asks: What if instead of moving Earth’s life elsewhere to the universe, entirely new life could be generated from materials that already exist there? What if instead of colonizing planets, we empower them to evolve on their own? Kaçar brings ideas that once lived only within the realm of science fiction fantasy to breathtaking possibilities.

Bevy Smith is a successful author, TV and radio host and entrepreneur who shows how to discover your authentic self—at any age. Bevy speaks from experience. Her own hard-earned lessons—learned from leaving a lucrative career as a jet-setting fashion executive to forging a truer path built on meaningful creativity and freedom—indeed prove that “it gets greater later.”  

A formidable and beloved on-air presence, Bevy is host of Sirius XM’s Bevelations, and was previously cohost of the nationally syndicated TV show Page Six TV. Her 2021 memoir, Bevelations: Lessons From a Mutha, Auntie, Bestie, is a roadmap to how each of us can live with confidence, honesty and joy.

Dr. Cecilia Aragon is an award-winning author, an airshow pilot and the first Latina full professor in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington in Seattle. She’s worked with Nobel Prize winners and has taught astronauts to fly. Her innovative research—and a stint at NASA designing software for Mars missions—led President Obama to call her “one of the top scientists and engineers in the country.”

Her memoir, Flying Free, shares her own journey of breaking past her own fears to become a champion aerobatic pilot. She loves math and science, and she’s passionate about helping others face their own fears and challenges to achieve their goals.

Chris Bennett is a Silicon Valley–based entrepreneur and early childhood education advocate. He’s cofounder and CEO of Wonderschool, an online platform that helps families find local childcare and preschool options—and supports those who provide it. Born of his own experience with excellent early in-home childcare and seeing the shortage of quality, convenient options for so many parents, he wondered: Why don't more people start their own in-home programs? Recognized by TIME and Fast Company as one of the top innovative companies, Wonderschool’s mission is to provide high-quality early-childhood education to every student in the country.

Angel investor and startup mentor David S. Rose is a legend to the world’s entrepreneurs. He’s raised millions for his own companies, and as an investor, he’s funded millions more. Need to know how to tell your organization’s story for impact? He wrote the book. Literally. His New York Times bestselling book, Angel Investing, has become the definitive how-to guide for anyone making or receiving angel investments. As associate founder and founding track chair for Finance, Entrepreneurship & Economics at Singularity University, he’s one of the world’s leading theorists on the future of business in a world of exponential technology growth.

Dean Furness speaks about what it takes to succeed when faced with challenges. In 2011, in the middle of his career as a data and analytics professional, an accident left him a paraplegic, without the use of his legs. But after several years of rehabilitation, hard work and encouragement from his physical therapist, he competed as a wheelchair athlete in both the Chicago and Boston marathons. Furness continues to train for marathons and aims to inspire others through a positive approach to owning each day. He is a husband, a father of three and a basketball coach.

Diana Adams (they/them) is a leading international lawyer and activist for LGBTQIA and underserved families. Founder of the Chosen Family Law Center and cofounder of the Polyamory Legal Advocacy Coalition, Adams advocates for those in consensually non-monogamous relationships and non-nuclear families.

 They are an expert on international LGBTQ policy, having written and passed the first multi-partner domestic partnership laws in the US and developed model ordinances for families, as well as corporate non-discrimination model provisions.
 A leading mediator and educator on communication skills, Adams also speaks on DEI, conflict resolution, consent, feminist empowerment and relationships.

Dr. Erika Hamden is a professor of astrophysics at the University of Arizona. Her current projects include FIREBall, a UV balloon-borne telescope; KCRM, a spectrograph for the Keck telescope; and Hyperion, a UV space telescope she is currently developing. However, these amazing innovations did not come without a lot of trial and error.

Failure can happen to anyone — not just to the people creating space telescopes. A presentation flops, a start-up has a bumpy launch, a new initiative hits some roadblocks. This can be a huge blow and can often prevent teams from trying again. But Hamden suggests taking a cue from the scientific method, which regards failure as an important —and necessary—step towards achieving progress.

“The whole premise of science is to prove that your hypothesis is wrong,” she says. “Discovery is mostly a process of finding things that don’t work, and failure is inevitable when you’re pushing the limits of knowledge.” She shares valuable advice for bouncing back, whether you’re pushing the bounds of outer space or hunkered down in a home office.

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Fariel Salahuddin is the founder and CEO of UpTrade (Goats for Water), a social enterprise that is empowering smallholder livestock farmers globally to use their livestock as currency to purchase otherwise expensive solar water pumps and solar home lighting systems. Goats for Water has received international acclaim for its innovation and Salahuddin has been featured as part of the BBC’s People Fixing the World program and in Inc. Magazine. Prior to starting Goats for Water, Salahuddin was an energy economist advising governments  and private organizations on energy policy and projects.  She's  passionate about bringing change to underserved populations through entrepreneurial endeavors.