Speaker Bio

Dr. Carter Christopher is Section Head for Human Dynamics R&D in Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Geospatial Science and Human Security Division. Dr. Christopher leads and integrates the Human Geography, Location Intelligence, Critical Infrastructure Resilience, Geospatial Data Modeling, and Geoinformatics Engineering research groups at the lab, to solve national- and global-scale challenges for Energy Security and National Security. He is also the Principal Investigator and/or Program Manager for a diverse portfolio of projects, ranging from hazardous material routing and risk characterization to large-scale human mobility modeling, to alternative PNT solutions for the electric grid.

Prior to joining ORNL, Dr. Christopher was Head of Geospatial at an aerospace start-up, and he had a distinguished 12-year career in the Intelligence Community. He spent more than 10 years at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency where he led a range of geospatial modernization programs, including ML/AI-driven object detection and mapping, cloud modernization and geospatial software-as-a-service provisioning for the IC, data science and advanced geospatial analysis, and global GIS training. Dr. Christopher closed his Federal career at the US State Department as Deputy to the Geographer of the United States, where he helped stand up the Department’s enterprise GIS and led human geography and humanitarian mapping initiatives. Prior to Federal service, Dr. Christopher held analyst and project management roles in the geospatial private sector. He has a PhD in Earth Systems and Geoinformation Science, a MS in Geography and Remote Sensing, and a BA in Government.