Sonja Schmer-Galunder is the Glenn and Deborah Renwick Leadership Professor of AI and Ethics at the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering at the University of Florida, where she directs the AI Ethics Program with a focus on the social and cultural dimensions in the ethical development and use of Artificial Intelligence. Based in San Francisco, she regularly travels to the UF campus.

Prior to her academic role, she served as Principal Scientist at Smart Information Flow Technologies. There, she spearheaded multiple multi-million dollar projects exploring technological innovations in the human domain, with particular emphasis on Natural Language Processing, value alignment and model bias. She secured over $10 million in research funding from agencies including DARPA and NASA bridging industry experience with academic leadership.