Secretary of Defense Ash Carter has added new names to the Defense Innovation Advisory Board, including astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.
Defense News reported the additions to the board, which he created in March to act as advisors to the Department of Defense on technology innovation.
Carter said the board is "charged with keeping DoD imbued with a culture of innovation in people, organizations, operations, and technology, to support people who innovate, those creative figures in our department who are willing to try new thing, fall fast, iterate; and also to ensure that we're always doing everything we can to stay ahead of potential adversaries."
Former Obama administration official, Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, was also added, along with seven other new members.
The board's leader is Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google's parent company, Alphabet. Other members include co-founder of LinkedIn Reid Hoffman and Instagram COO Marne Levine.
Defense News reports the biggest names on the board are Tyson, whom they called "the face of popular science around the world today," and Bezos, who founded Amazon and owns The Washington Post.
The board is set to provide first recommendations to Carter by October, Defense News reports.
Carter was awarded the "Ronald Reagan Peace Through Strength" award by the Reagan National Defense Forum, according to the
Washington Examiner.
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