Karen Bakker
Karen Bakker studies the implications of digital innovation for governance and sustainability. Her current research project is situated at the confluence of two transformational trends: digitization and global environmental change. How are digital technologies (e.g., artificial intelligence, blockchain, and digital bioacoustics) being mobilized to address biodiversity loss and climate change? What are the potential benefits and pitfalls? Bakker is a professor at the University of British Columbia, in Vancouver, Canada and the author of more than 100 academic publications and seven books, including The Sounds of Life: How Digital Technology Is Bringing Us Closer to the Worlds of Animals and Plants The Sounds of Life(Princeton University Press, 2022). She is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists and a member of the board of Global Environmental Change. Her work has been recognized by numerous awards, including an Annenberg Fellowship in Communication from Stanford University’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences and a Guggenheim Fellowship. She holds a BASc from McMaster University and a DPhil from the University of Oxford, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar.