Chris Gerdes is a Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University. His laboratory studies how cars move, how humans drive cars and how to design future cars that work cooperatively with the driver or drive themselves. Vehicles in the lab include X1, a student-built electric, steer-by-wire test vehicle; Takumi, a modified Toyota Supra capable of autonomous drifting in tandem with another car; and Marty, the electrified, automated, drifting DeLorean. Chris' interests in vehicle safety extend to ethics and government policy, having helped to develop the US Federal Automated Vehicle Policy while serving as the first Chief Innovation Officer of the US Department of Transportation.