Our Team | Society for UAP Studies

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BOARD OF DIRECTORS

STEERING COMMITTEE

DIVISIONAL LEADERSHIP

SUPPORTING TEAM

STRATEGIC ADVISORS

BOARD OF ADVISORS

Our Leadership & Team

Six bodies carry the Society’s work: two in governance, two in operations, two in advice.

Board of Directors

Advisory Council

Divisional Leadership

Supporting Team

Strategic Advisors

Board of Advisors

Legal and fiduciary responsibility for the Society as a nonprofit corporation.

Standing steering body; advises on research direction, ethics and institutional development.

Runs the departments, the public-facing programmes and the Society’s institutional relationships.

Coordinates work across departments and units; volunteers.

Subject-area counsel to the executive on strategy, policy and operations.

Scholars and practitioners who ground the Society in the field and nominate future Committee seats.

GOVERNANCE

The bodies that hold responsibility for the Society and steer its direction.

Board of Directors

Board of Directors

The Board of Directors is responsible for the organization as a nonprofit corporate entity. The direction the Society takes as a learned and professional body is shaped by its departmental directors, in regular consultation with the Steering Committee, which is separate from the standing Panel of Advisors.

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Michael C. Cifone, Ph.D.

President and Executive Director · Co-founder

Ph.D. University of Maryland, philosophy of science, with a focus on the philosophical foundations of theoretical physics. Now works entirely on UAP studies and the conceptual foundations of the emerging science. Founded Limina and the Society.

Michael D. Silberstein, Ph.D.

Secretary · Co-founder

Full Professor of Philosophy at Elizabethtown College, founding member of its Cognitive Science programme and permanent Adjunct in Philosophy at the University of Maryland. Publishes on the foundations of physics, of cognitive science and of complexity theory.

Thomas Scheiding, Ph.D.

Chief Financial Officer

Doctorate in Economics from the University of Notre Dame, with a dissertation on the economics of academic journals and learned societies. Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Hawai‘i.

Steering Committee

Advisory Council

A standing body of appointed experts offering strategic, ethical and interdisciplinary guidance to the Society’s leadership. They work regularly with the Executive Director to help shape the Society's research direction, public posture and institutional development.

Greg Eghigian, Ph.D.

Historical & Ethical Inquiry

Penn State University

Michaël Vaillant, M.Sc.

Data Science & Technical Analysis

UAP Check

Dillon Guthrie, J.D.

Law & Public Policy

DLA Piper

Edoardo Russo, M.A.

European UAP History & Policy

Centro Italiano Studi Ufologici (CISU)

Gretchen Stahlman, Ph.D.

Information Science & Integration

Florida State University

Divisional Leadership

EXECUTIVE AND OPERATIONS

The people who run the Society’s programmes and keep it working day to day.

Divisional Leadership

Divisional executives and departmental directors run the Society’s public-facing programmes, hold its relationships with scholars, academic institutions and mission-aligned organizations, and build the administrative infrastructure that a growing community of researchers requires. They bring both academic and industry experience to that work.

Rafael Di Carlantonio

Chief Operations Officer

Italy

Zak Swenson

Director of Digital Development

United States

Laura Dominé, Ph.D.

AURA Program Manager

Japan

Peter Sforza

Director of Research Programs

United States

Maya Cowan

Director of Community Programs

United States

Justin Pearl, Ph.D.

Director of Publications

United States

Francisco Mourão Corrêa

Director Academic Outreach, Europe

Portugal

Adam Dodd, Ph.D.

Director of Academic Events

Australia

Esteban Corio

Director Academic Outreach, Latin America

Argentina

Supporting Team

Supporting Team

Volunteers who coordinate work across the Society’s departments and organizational units, and who give it their time. They help build the academic and administrative infrastructure that sustains research and raises the level of public discussion on UAP. The Society is a community-driven endeavour, and does not run without them.

Greg Bishop

Senior Correspondent, Digital Communications and Publications

Carissa Dahik

Community Outreach Coordinator and Social Media Coordinator

Deborah West

Society Newsletter Editor and Senior Marketing Advisor

Strategic Advisors

ADVICE AND COMMUNITY

External expertise the Society draws on, and its standing in the wider field.

Strategic Advisors

Appointed by the executive leadership, the Strategic Advisors are subject-area and industry experts who support the leadership team on strategy, policy and the foundations of the Society’s operational and programmatic development.

Brandon Pendleton

Senior AI Policy Advisor

N.J. Todd

Government Engagement & Policy

Edward C. Wolff, Ph.D.

Government Engagement & Policy

Michael P. Ross

Experiencer Engagement & Cognitive Systems Strategy

Panel of Advisors

Board of Advisors

Scholars and practitioners who advise the Society on the substance of the field, drawn from universities and research institutions across Europe, North America, Asia, Africa, Australia and Latin America.

Humanities

Brenda Denzler, Ph.D.

SUAPS

Sean Esbjörn-Hargens, Ph.D.

CIHS

James Madden, Ph.D.

Benedictine College

Michael E. Zimmerman, Ph.D.

Emeritus - University of Colorado, Boulder

Adam Dodd, Ph.D.

University of Queensland, (Australia)

Stephen Finley, Ph.D.

Louisiana State University

Andreas Müller

GreWi.de | IFEX

Greg Eghigian, Ph.D.

Penn State University

Steven Fuller, Ph.D.

University of Warwick (U.K.)

Mark O'Connell

Author & J. Allen Hynek Biographer

Kimberly Engels, Ph.D.

Molloy University

Michael Glawson, Ph.D.

Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

Ted Peters, Ph.D.

Graduate Theological Union

Social & Human Sciences

Social & Human Sciences

Hussein Ali Agrama, Ph.D.

University of Chicago

Social & Human Sciences

Paul Kingsbury, Ph.D.

Simon Fraser University (Canada) | SCU

Social & Human Sciences

Nikola Schmidt, Ph.D.

Prague Institute of International Relations

Social & Human Sciences

William Dewan, Ph.D.

UC Irvine

Social & Human Sciences

Tim Murithi, Ph.D.

University of Free State, South Africa

Social & Human Sciences

Gretchen Stahlman, Ph.D.

Florida State University

Social & Human Sciences

Dillon Guthrie, J.D.

SUAPS

Social & Human Sciences

Inbar Pincu

Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Israel)

Social & Human Sciences

Michael Uhall, Ph.D.

Indiana University East

Social & Human Sciences

Eli Karetny, J.D., Ph.D.

City University of New York

Social & Human Sciences

Joshua Pierson, D.S.S.

Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

Social & Human Sciences

Edward C. Wolff, Ph.D.

SUAPS

Natural Sciences & Engineering

Ramon Carbó-Dorca, Ph.D.

University of Girona (Spain)

Filipe Nascimento, Ph.D.

University College London (U.K.)

Wesley Watters, Ph.D.

Wellesley College | Galileo Project

Jérôme Ezan, Ph.D.

Neurocentre Magendie-INSERM U1215

Erling Strand, Ph.D.

Emeritus - Østfold University College (Norway)

Gene Greneker

UAPx | RADAR Flashlight

Matthew Szydagis, Ph.D.

SUNY Albany | UAPx

Kevin H. Knuth, Ph.D.

State University of New York, Albany

Massimo Teodorani, Ph.D.

SUAPS | Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

UAP Forensics

Bill Chalker

SUAPS

Michaël Vaillant, M.S.

UAP Check (France)

Rich Hoffman

Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

Jinwoo Yu

Korean UAP Research Network

Peter Reali, M.S.

Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

Mark Rodeghier, Ph.D.

J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies

MEMBERSHIP

Join the Society

Membership funds peer-reviewed research and open scholarship, and puts you inside the field as it forms. Members reach the full archive of recorded seminars and receive discounts on courses.

Cost should not keep a scholar out. Request a waiver, and we will find a way.

Become a member

Support our work

Members reach the full archive of recorded seminars and Limina, and receive discounts on courses. Community, Affiliate, and Institutional levels are available, with waivers on request.

See membership options

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