Theme: CenTEDial

TEDxRiceU: CenTEDial promotes an exchange of “ideas worth spreading” within the Rice community and beyond the hedges in the local Houston area. We bring together our leading thinkers and doers in all disciplines to spark productive discussions and inspire meaningful challenges. We hope to let the student body at Rice realize the “unconventional wisdom” that blankets the campus, and encourage students to explore their opportunities to be unique.

McMurtry Auditorium, Duncan Hall
6100 Main Street
Houston, Texas, 77005
United States

John Alford

John R. Alford is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Rice University. His current research focuses on the biology of political behavior, including neuroscience and genetics. His work in this area has been funded by the National Science Foundation and published in major journals including Science, the American Political Science Review, PLOS ONE and Political Psychology. The findings have been widely reported in the popular media including the science section of the New York Times, Forbes, the cover of New Scientist and other outlets ranging from CSPAN’s Washington Journal to the Rush Limbaugh Show.

Carlos Jiménez

Carlos Jimenez is professor of Architecture at Rice School of Architecture and principal of Carlos Jimenez Studio. He has held distinguished chairs at Tulane University, Harvard, University of Oregon, U.C.Berkeley, and at the University of Texas at Austin. Professor Jimenez is a frequent lecturer, juror and visiting critic at academic and cultural institutions across the Americas, Europe, Asia and the Middle East, and was a long-term jury member of the Pritzker Architecture Prize (2001-2011). His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and is the subject of dedicated monographs and books. Recent awards include Rice University’s Duncan Award (2006), AIA Houston Educator of the Year (2009), TEC de Monterrey Academic Leader Award (2010) and one of Design Intelligence Most Admired Educators for 2013.

Gracie Cavnar

Gracie Cavnar is a lifelong cooking and gardening enthusiast. In 1998, a news item about vending machines in elementary schools caught her eye and moved her to action. While working to remove junk food from schools in Texas, she learned about the widespread epidemic of childhood obesity and the astounding affect it was having on American lives and wallets. She decided to focus her energy on turning back the tide of childhood obesity and launched Recipe for Success Foundation in 2005 to change the way children understand, appreciate and eat their food. She has received many awards and recognition for her work and grown her Seed-to-Plate Nutrition Education (TM) for children from a small pilot in Houston to one with national scope. She has taught tens of thousands of children that growing and cooking their own healthy food can be easy, tasty and fun and empowered them with information and skills to make healthy decisions for life. In recent years, Cavnar has expanded her focus to include food access issues and junk food marketing that targets children. Gracie donates her time as CEO of the Foundation while she continues to write news articles, feature stories, editorials and to blog. Eat It! Food Adventures with Marco Polo, her first children’s book, was published in 2012.

Robert Cavnar

Robert L. Cavnar is a 30-plus year veteran of the oil and gas industry with deep experience in business start-ups, turn-arounds, and management of oil and gas companies. Mr. Cavnar is a featured blogger on Huffington Post, and he has written extensively on global and national energy policy, the environment, and climate change. In June 2010, he was named by Newsweek as “Trending Up” in its Who Can You Trust, Oil Spill Edition series and is author of Disaster on the Horizon: High Stakes, High Risks, and the Story Behind the Deepwater Well Blowout, which was recognized with the Silver Award from ForeWord Reviews for Book of the Year 2010 in the Environment category. Mr. Cavnar holds a Master of Business Administration degree from Southern Methodist University, a Bachelor of Science degree from Eastern Michigan University, and completed the Program for Management Development at the Harvard Business School. He is currently on the Board of Trustees for KIPP Houston, a national charter school program, as well as a member of the Advisory Board for the Center for National Policy in Washington, D.C. Mr. Cavnar is Chairman Emeritus of the Board of the Houston Grand Opera and co-founder of Recipe for Success Foundation, dedicated to fighting childhood obesity.

Yousif Shamoo

Yousif Shamoo is the Director of the Rice University Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering and is an expert on the adaptation of normally harmless bacteria into hospital superbugs that are resistant to so many antibiotics. With fewer and fewer new drugs coming through the pipeline it is time to re-think how we fight these nasty bacteria from reacting to them, to anticipating their moves, and getting ahead of them.

Jeffrey Jacot

Jeffrey Jacot and his collaborators are growing heart tissue using stem cells found in amniotic fluid. This tissue may one day be used to fix heart defects in infants, eliminating the need for heart transplants or multiple and complex surgeries. As director of the Pediatric Cardiac Bioengineering Laboratory at Texas Children’s Hospital and assistant professor of bioengineering at Rice University, he works alongside surgeons, clinicians, radiologists and biologists to understand the clinical needs in congenital heart defect management and repair, analyze the mechanical and biological processes in heart tissue development, and develop novel biomaterials for tissue-engineered heart muscle.

Michelle Hebl

Many displays of discrimination are now prevented by protective laws. However, subtle forms of discrimination are pervasive and enacted in everyday interpersonal interactions. These micro-transgressions, incivilities, and other negative interpersonal biases are subtle but very profound in both their display and implications. Mikki Hebl, a professor in psychology and management at Rice University, studies such discrimination as well as reduction strategies.