Trained as a physicist, Marilyne Andersen is Director General of the GESDA Foundation, whose mission is to anticipate emerging scientific discoveries and translate them into concrete actions for the benefit of society by engaging proactively with policymakers and diplomats.
A leading expert in the field of daylight in relation to neuroscience and psychophysics, she is also Full Professor at EPFL and Head of the LIPID lab, where she has been conducting pioneering work at the interface between science, engineering and design while being actively engaged in bridging the gap between art and science.
Dean of the ENAC School at EPFL from 2013 and 2018, where she notably carried the development of the EPFL Fribourg associate campus (Smart Living Lab), she initiated and led from 2022 until 2025 a Swiss-wide research consortium on the energy transition with a focus on the future of living and working, involving 10 academic institutions and 30 partners from the public and private sectors. She also leverages her research in practice through OCULIGHT dynamics, a start-up she co-founded that offers specialised consulting services on daylight and its psycho-physiological effects on building occupants.
Before joining EPFL, Marilyne Andersen has been a Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) from 2004 to 2010, and a Visiting Professor at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL) in California and at the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD). She has been expert to the Innovation Council of InnoSuisse and on the Boards of the global Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction, the ArtTech and the Culture du Bâti Foundations.