You've seen him on 60 Minutes, the scientist whose team mapped the human genome. Regarded as one of the leading scientists of the 21st century, he and his team decoded the genome of the first free-living organism in 1995.

But these days, J. Craig Venter, Ph.D., is no longer reading genetic codes; he's creating them with synthetic cells. Find out what the future looks like to this controversial microbiologist—join us for a lecture on the Queens University of Charlotte campus sponsored by The Learning Society.

He is founder, chairman and president of the J. Craig Venter Institute, a not-for-profit research organization with 400 scientists and staff dedicated to genomic research. He is also founder and CEO of Synthetic Genomics Inc., a company dedicated to commercializing genomic-driven solutions to address global needs such as new sources of energy and next-generation vaccines.