MARY M YANG, PhD

Dr. Mary M. Yang is the co-founder and former executive of an innovative biotech company that provided solutions to challenging problems in the pharmaceutical, diagnostics and chemical manufacturing industries. She is a scientist by training and received her BS in Chemistry from UC Berkeley and a PhD in Geological and Geophysical Sciences from Princeton University where she was an NSF Fellow.  She is an inventor on 12 patents, author of numerous scientific publications, and was nominated for NASA's Woman-Owned Subcontractor of the Year.  Earlier, Mary also held positions at MIT, the ETH in Zurich, Switzerland, California Institute of Technology, NASA’s Ames Research Center and the Jet Propulsion Lab. In addition to commercial contracts to the company, her work has been supported by NASA, DOE, NIH and the NSF.

Having lived and been educated in various countries, Mary was able to experience first-hand, many different cultures, see refugee camps and extreme poverty, and understand at an early age that water, trees and food are precious, and that many do not have easy access to it.  Throughout her life, she has embraced the natural world and all of its creatures.  Mary and her partner are passionate about education and protecting our natural environment.  In addition to graduate fellowships and programs for disadvantaged youth, she also served on the Steering Committee for the 2008 San Diego Foundation’s Focus 2050 Study.  This 170 page report was a wakeup call to climate change effects in the San Diego region if we continued with business as usual.

More recently, Mary is a Steering Committee member for the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography UCSD, served as Director of Climate Action Campaign from 2017 – 2024 and is active in several other environmental organizations.  Previously, she was a Director of the San Diego Natural History Museum, Chair of the Climate Action Commission and member of the Clean & Green Committee for the City of Solana Beach.  During her twelve-year tenure in the latter two positions, Mary assisted the City in establishing its first climate action plan, the County’s first Community Choice Energy, passing the County’s first plastic bag ban, a more comprehensive ordinance prohibiting single use plastics, a climate emergency declaration, and a building electrification ordinance. In 2019, Mary was recognized by California Senate President Toni Atkins, as a Woman of the Year for her civic engagement.