Christian Wedemeyer is an historian of religions whose interests comprehend theory and method in the human sciences, the history of modern scholarship on religion and culture, and issues of history, textuality, and ritual in the Buddhist traditions. Within these very general domains, much of his research has concerned the esoteric (Tantric) Buddhism of India and Tibet.

Professor Hopkins is a theologian working in the areas of contemporary models of theology, various forms of liberation theologies (especially black and other third-world manifestations), and East-West cross-cultural comparisons.

Professor Heo is an anthropologist of religion, media, and economy.  Her research and teaching at the University of Chicago's Divinity School covers a range of topics related to the critical study of global Christianities in the modern world. These topics explore the intersection of everyday religious practices with colonial and national institutions of rule, along with political economies of development and globalization.

Professor Ziporyn is a scholar of ancient and medieval Chinese religion and philosophy who has distinguished himself as a premier expositor and translator of some of the most complex philosophical texts and concepts of the Chinese religious traditions. Ziporyn is the author of four published books, including Evil And/Or/As the Good: Omnicentric Holism, Intersubjectivity, and Value Paradox in Tiantai Buddhist Thought, The Penumbra Unbound: The Neo-Taoist Philosophy of Guo Xiang, and Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings with Selections from Traditional Commentaries.

Professor Licha comes from the Department of Japanese Studies at the University of Heidelberg. He received his PhD from SOAS (London) in 2012. Prof. Licha specializes in the intellectual history of Japanese Buddhism, with an emphasis on the interactions between the pre-modern tantric, Tendai, and Zen traditions, and the global history of Buddhist modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. 

Professor Chu is a social anthropologist who specializes in the economic effects of industrialization on Chinese culture. She also does ethnographic fieldwork focusing on Chinese urbanization and migration patterns.