Alex Dehgan is the science and technology adviser to the Administrator at USAID and he heads the Office of Science and Technology. As USAID’s chief scientist, Dehgan is the key focal point for implementing the Administrator’s vision to ensure that USAID is the global leader on employing science, technology and creativity to help solve development challenges. Dehgan is working to elevate the role of science and technology in shaping development strategies; identify and coordinate novel science-based initiatives to better advance the Agency’s mission; support and help advance existing technical personnel at USAID and bring in new specialized expertise; and develop novel relationships with nontraditional partners in academia, the private sector and U.S. government technical agencies. Prior to coming to USAID, Dehgan worked at the Department of State, most recently as a senior scientist and policy adviser to the Secretary of State’s science adviser to the. Dehgan was also a senior adviser to the special adviser for the Gulf and South West Asia, where he developed a science diplomacy engagement strategy with Iran, advised on internal political dynamics, and served as the liaison to the Office of the Special Representative to the President for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Dehgan’s other positions at the Department of State include serving as a member of the Secretary of State’s policy planning staff focused on the Middle East, as an American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) diplomacy fellow in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs (NEA), and as the special advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority for Nonproliferation in Iraq. Dehgan was the founding Afghanistan country director for the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Afghanistan Biodiversity Conservation Program. During his tenure there, Dehgan led the first comprehensive biological surveys of the country in 30 years, wrote many of Afghanistan’s biodiversity conservation legislation and policies, and assisted in the development of Afghanistan’s national park system. Dehgan holds a Ph.D. and M.Sc. from The University of Chicago’s Committee on Evolutionary Biology, a J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law, and B.S. in Zoology and Political Science from Duke University. He was chosen as an “Icon of Science” by Seed Magazine in 2005 and received the World Technology Award for Policy in 2011.