Margret E. Kosal

Bio

Dr. Margaret E. Kosal is an Associate Professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, where she serves as Director of the Sam Nunn Security Program and the Georgia Tech Military Fellows Program. She holds appointments as affiliated faculty in the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience and the Georgia Tech Institute for Matter and Systems (IMS). Her research uses theories and concepts from the social sciences, primarily international relations, to explore relationships among science, technology, and security and to explain how these phenomena impact geopolitics. She focuses on two, often intersecting, areas: understanding the politics of emerging technologies and reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

She is also the co-founder of a sensor company, where she led research and development of medical, biological, chemical sensors and explosives detection. During AY 2016-2017, she served as a Senior Adjunct Scholar to the Modern War Institute at West Point. Kosal previously has served as a Senior Advisor to the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, as Science and Technology Advisor within the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), and as an Associate to the National Intelligence Council (NIC). From June 2022-23, she served as Senior Fellow at the US Department of Energy’s Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) helping stand up the new Nonproliferation Applied Sciences Center (NASC). She remains a Joint Faculty Appointee to SRNL in addition to also serving as a member of the SRNL National Security Advisory Board (NSAB).

Honors & Awards

She is the recipient of multiple awards including the Office of the Secretary of Defense Award for Excellence. In January 2017, Kosal was appointed the Editor-in-Chief of the Cambridge University Press journal, Politics and the Life Sciences. Most recently, she was appointed Chair of the US National Academies Committee on Engaging Scientists in Shared Responsible Innovation in Neuroscience in Southeast Asia. She also has served as the Vice Chair of the US National Academies Committee on Assessing and Improving Strategies for Preventing, Countering, and Responding to Weapons of Mass Destruction Terrorism: Chemical Threats and Study Member on the Committee tasked with assessing Biological Threats.