Stephen Maren is director of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology and professor of psychology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he joined the faculty in 2024. Maren’s research seeks to understand the neural basis of anxiety disorders and post-traumatic stress disorder. He earned his B.S. at Illinois and his M.S. and Ph.D. at the University of Southern California. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, Los Angeles. He's held tenured faculty positions at the University of Michigan and Texas A&M University.

The associate director for research oversees Beckman's research enterprise and shared research facilities. The leaders of Beckman's core facilities report to her, as does Beckman's human participants research coordinator.

The associate director for administration oversees these groups:

• Budget and resource planning
• Facilities (including security and shipping and receiving)
• Ted's Café
• Human resources
• Information Technology Services