Stuart Brown is Co-Founder of PlayNovation, and is Founder and President of the National Institute for Play.

Trained in general and internal medicine, psychiatry and clinical research, Stuart Brown first recognized the importance of play by discovering its absence in the lives of mass murderers, homicidal males and felony drunken drivers.

Stuart Brown has conducted over 6,000 play histories ranging from homicidal males in the Texas prison system to numerous Nobel Laureates. His broad based evaluations of highly creative individuals revealed the centrality of playfulness to their success and well-being.

StuartBrown has worked with Jane Goodall in Africa studying animal play which led to his being sponsored by the National Geographic Society and resulting in his authoring a National Geographic magazine cover article and the production of a National Geographic Explorer program, each on animal play behavior.

Stuart Brown’s recent years of independent scholarship and exploration of the evolution and neuroscience of human and animal play have helped to focus a central commitment bringing the promises and stories of play into general cultural consciousness. He produced a 3 hour Public Broadcasting System series, The Promise of Play, and a companion book to the PBS film, Where Do the Children Play, as well as conducted the first conference on the Status of Play Science at Stanford University. Other films he produced are the PBS Soul of the Universe, and National Geographic’s Stress: Portrait of a Killer, featuring Stanford University neurobiologist, MacArthur “genius” grant recipient and renowned author Robert Sapolsky. Stuart Brown spent over ten years working with mythologist Joseph Campbell, producing numerous films and written works.

Stuart Brown continues to co-teach with PlayNovation Advisor Brendan Boyle, From Play to Innovation, in Stanford’s d.school, the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design, to a select group of graduate students. Students use play to develop products and services with real-world corporate partners such as Con-Agra, Visa and others.

Stuart Brown has authored Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul. He continues to actively present keynotes and workshops internationally, is a frequent consultant to Fortune 500 companies and has been featured on NPR, The New York Times, PBS News Hour, ABC Nightly News and numerous other media outlets and national publications.

Stuart Brown is a storyteller who likes to bring the story of Play Science to diverse audiences. An avid hiker, he also enjoys imagining himself as a very competitive tennis player.

Brendan Boyle believes that play is the key to innovation. With this as a guiding principle, he is a toy  inventor, consulting associate professor at Stanford University’s d.school, and Partner at IDEO. He founded the Toy Lab to deliver kid-centered solutions to counter boredom, which he sees as the opposite of play. Under his leadership, the Toy Lab has invented and licensed hundreds of toys and apps, including the best-selling Jumperoo and Elmo Calls.

Brendan also consults with companies to redesign their organizational behavior to include play; developed and continues to teach From Play to Innovation at the Stanford d.school; and co-authored The Klutz Book of Inventions, the Parents’ Choice Award-winning encyclopedia of never-before-seen inventions.