Congreso Futuro, which has been held every year for more than a decade, is the largest science, knowledge, and innovation gathering in Latin America, bringing the public into contact with the brilliant minds that are creating future.
Eleven years, 11 regions, and more than 80 presenters. After more than a decade making history as the leading event for science, knowledge, and innovation in Chile and Latin America, the Congress is preparing for a new in-person and online event that will continue to bring science to the people.
This year, the meeting will take place from January 17-21 and will include presenters from Chile and more than 20 other countries. Each presenter will offer their interpretation of the slogan Aprender a convivir (Learning to Live Together), which invites attendees to view the community as the basic unit for constructing a new world, at the same time as it brings greater awareness and understanding of the complex web that connects all inhabitants of the planet.
Over its eleven-year history, the Congress has brought together more than 800 thinkers, scientists, researchers, Nobel laureates, opinion leaders, and artists from more than 40 countries, all distinguished in their fields. This year will be no exception.
Four Nobel Laureates are among the presenters. Esther Duflo, from France, the 2019 Nobel prizewinner in Economics and an expert in poverty and inequality research; Stanley Whittingham, 2019 Nobel laureate in Chemistry, who discovered a key process in lithium battery production in the 1970s; German-born Harald Zur Hausen, who won the Nobel for Medicine in 2008 for his discoveries related to the human papiloma virus; and Muhammad Yunus, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his efforts to foster social and economic development.
Other guest speakers are names that the world has gotten to know and trust due to their role in the management of the pandemic, including Anthony Fauci, Director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), recognized as one of the word’s leading experts on epidemics; Tedros Adhanom, Director-General of the WHO; and Uruguayan virologist Gonzalo Moratorio, creator of one of the first tests to detect Covid, who in 2020 was named by the journal Nature as one of the globe’s 10 most influential scientists.
Congreso Futuro in Chile’s regions
Since 2016, Congreso Futuro has been held concurrently in many of Chile’s regions, with the aim of decentralizing the event to enable participants from across the country to take part in the discussions about science, technology, and the society of the future.
This year, in addition to the Metropolitan Region, the Congress has organized events in 10 regions of Chile: Antofagasta, Coquimbo, Valparaíso, O’Higgins, Maule, Biobío, La Araucanía, Los Ríos, Aysén, and Magallanes.
Inaugurating the first Congress in Magallanes region, for example, are Sharon Robinson, an expert on climate change and the Antarctic continent, and Argentinean immunologist Oscar Bottasso, who is now working on a cure for COVID-19. On the final day of the Congress, the closing session in Los Ríos region will feature Enric Sala, Director of National Geographic’s Pristine Seas initiative, while Jemma Wadham, a glaciology scholar at the Arctic University of Norway, will speak in the Aysén region.
The entire event can be followed on Congreso Futuro’s official social media channels and its website, www.congresofuturo.cl.
