Robert O'Malley in the field observing chimpanzeesWho or what motivates your work at HMS?
My work as part of the Personal Genetics Education Project (pgEd) is fundamentally about empowering people to share and learn about forefront science issues. I believe strongly that the work of science must be engaged with the interests, values, and priorities of humanity at large — and particularly with those communities that have been marginalized, excluded, or harmed by the impacts of science and technology.

What was your path to your current role?
My academic background is in primate behavior and ecology. I studied wild chimpanzees at Gombe National Park in Tanzania for many years before transitioning to public engagement with science. For six years, I led a project to support science engagement between scientific and religious communities at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). I'm very excited to bring what I learned through that project into the work of the pgEd program.