Smith is an assistant professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society. She studies the role of new technological innovations in post-conflict settings and has worked with families, scientists, and activist groups in Argentina, Guatemala, and Peru to document how citizens and scientists have drawn on DNA as a tool for justice after genocide. In her current work, Dr. Smith focuses on migration from Central America to the United States to help document the violence and disappearance that migrants suffer in Mexico and the US-borderlands. At the core of her writing, research and teaching lies the question of how and when new technologies can be used to address human suffering caused by violence and dispossession. The recipient of fellowships from the Mellon Foundation, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, and Northwestern University, as well as grants from the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health, she has published articles in key journals in the social studies of science and is currently completing her book, “Subversive Genes: Making DNA and Human Rights in Argentina