The Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society and the Banatao Institute (CITRIS) has announced the recipients of the 2026 EDGE in Tech Athena Awards. Celebrating its tenth year, the program recognizes individuals and organizations whose leadership is expanding opportunity and participation across STEM, technology and entrepreneurship.
Presented by CITRIS in six categories, the 2026 awards honor leaders at every stage of their careers—from graduate students to industry and academic trailblazers—as well as an organization advancing the next generation of talent. Recipients were nominated by peers and selected through a competitive review process.
“For a decade, the Athena Awards have celebrated leaders who are opening doors for others and strengthening pathways into STEM and technology,” said Jill Finlayson, managing director of the CITRIS Innovation Hub. “Their work helps ensure that innovation benefits from the broadest range of perspectives and experiences.”
The 2026 EDGE in Tech Athena Awards will be presented at a ceremony hosted by CITRIS and the Banatao Institute at UC Berkeley in fall 2026.
“We are proud to recognize leaders whose work is creating opportunities for future generations of innovators,” said Camille Crittenden, executive director of CITRIS and co-founder of EDGE in Tech at UC. “Their contributions are helping shape a more inclusive future for technology, research and entrepreneurship.”
2026 EDGE in Tech Athena Award Recipients
Executive Leadership Award
Beth Rattner
Chief Sustainability Officer, Endeavour; President, Endeavour Women in Tech
Beth Rattner is chief sustainability officer for Endeavour and president of Endeavour Women in Tech, where she advances resource-efficient innovation and expands opportunities for women in technical fields. With more than 20 years of experience spanning the private and nonprofit sectors—including leadership roles at HP and the Biomimicry Institute—she works to align digital infrastructure with environmental and social sustainability goals through partnerships with universities, governments and industry. A recognized advocate for responsible innovation, her thought leadership includes the Explorer’s Club briefing The Cost of Compute: A $7 Trillion Race to Scale Data Centers and a widely viewed TEDxBoston talk on biological design principles.
Academic Leadership Award
The Honorable Dr. Asmeret Asefaw Berhe
Falasco Chair in Earth Sciences and Geology, Professor of Soil Biogeochemistry, and Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UC Merced
The Honorable Dr. Asmeret Asefaw Berhe is a globally recognized climate scientist whose research explores the climate system, carbon sequestration and land degradation. A UC Berkeley alumna and director of both the Sierra Nevada Research Institute and the Climate Institute at UC Merced, she also served as director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science from 2022 to 2024, where she established the agency’s first requirement for Promoting Inclusive and Equitable Research (PIER) plans. A champion for expanding opportunity in science, Berhe is co-principal investigator of the NSF-funded ADVANCEGeo project, which empowers geoscientists to combat workplace harassment, and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering. Her honors include the American Geophysical Union’s Joanne Simpson Medal, the Geological Society of America’s Bromery Award, the Geochemical Society’s John Hayes Award and the NSF CAREER Award.
Early Career Leadership Award
Saloni Garg
Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Adobe
Saloni Garg is an AI engineer specializing in machine learning infrastructure, model optimization and multimodal generative AI systems. Her work spans computer vision, federated learning and the societal implications of emerging technologies, with a focus on translating advanced AI research into practical applications. She is co-author of the forthcoming textbook RAG Artificial Intelligence: Retrieval-Augmented Generation in Generative AI (De Gruyter) and serves as a peer reviewer for IEEE and ICT conferences.
Beyond her technical contributions, Garg is a champion for open-source innovation and expanding access to technology. She has been recognized with the Red Hat Women in Open Source Award, the Google Venkat Scholarship and Mozilla’s Open Leader Fellowship, and actively mentors aspiring engineers through organizations including Women Who Code, 1 Million Women to Tech and Google Women Techmakers.
Graduate Student Leadership Award
Grace Hu
Doctoral Research Fellow, UC Berkeley–UCSF Joint Graduate Program in Bioengineering
Grace Hu is a Ph.D. candidate in the joint UC Berkeley–UCSF Bioengineering Graduate Program, where she is co-advised by Professors Grace Gu and Zev Gartner. Her research combines computer vision and 3D bioprinting to control tissue interfaces and guide tissue self-organization, earning support from the Department of Defense’s NDSEG Fellowship, the Bakar BioEnginuity Impact Grant and the Founder Region Fellowship. Hu earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Stanford University, where she worked on printable batteries and AI-enabled education technologies. Beyond her research, she serves as a Diversity & Community Fellow at UC Berkeley and is an active advocate for mentorship, STEM equity, science communication and technology policy.
Lifetime Achievement Award
Dr. Carolyn Bertozzi
Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Chemistry, Stanford University; Director of Sarafan ChEM-H
Dr. Carolyn Bertozzi is a Nobel Prize–winning chemist, entrepreneur and mentor whose pioneering work in bioorthogonal chemistry has transformed cancer therapy, molecular imaging and drug delivery. Awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, she has also translated her research into practice through the launch of 12 biotechnology companies. A UC Berkeley alumna (Ph.D. ’93) and former Berkeley faculty member, Bertozzi is equally recognized for her commitment to mentorship and scientific leadership, earning both the UC Berkeley Distinguished Teaching Award and the AAAS Lifetime Mentor Award. Through collaborative training programs and initiatives such as the open-access journal ACS Central Science, she has worked to expand access to scientific opportunity and advance the field of chemical biology worldwide.
Next-Generation Engagement Award
Ada Developers Academy
Ada Developers Academy is a tuition-free software development school that expands access to tech careers for women, gender-expansive individuals and others historically underrepresented in the industry. Led by Interim CEO Alexandra Holien, Ada combines rigorous technical training with a commitment to equity and economic mobility through programs including Ada Build, a free introductory coding curriculum, and Ada Core, its flagship 11-month software engineering program. Since its founding, the academy has enrolled more than 1,300 students, the majority of whom are people of color, immigrants, first-generation college students or members of the LGBTQIA+ community. Graduates enter the workforce with an average salary of more than $120,000, creating significant economic opportunity for individuals and communities traditionally excluded from the technology sector.
The EDGE in Tech Athena Awards are made possible through the support of partners across the University of California and beyond. CITRIS and the Banatao Institute extend their appreciation to former Berkeley Engineering Dean Tsu-Jae King Liu, whose leadership and commitment to expanding opportunity in technology helped establish and sustain the program.
To learn more about the EDGE in Tech Athena Awards and the work of CITRIS and the Banatao Institute, visit CITRIS-UC.org.