Stephan Mertens received his Ph.D. in Physics from Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany in 1991. His Ph.D. advisor was Annette Zippelius, and his thesis was on the theory of neural networks, which back then was very fashionable. His current research focuses on phase transitions in computational problems, algorithms for hard problems in statistical physics, and parallel computing. With Cristopher Moore he is the author of The Nature of Computation.

Cristopher Moore received his Ph.D. in Physics from Cornell University in 1991. His Ph.D. advisor was Philip Holmes, and his thesis was on undecidable problems in dynamical systems. Two out of three members of his thesis committee agreed that it warranted a degree in Physics. He now works at the boundary of computer science and physics, on topics including quantum computation, phase transitions, and social networks. With Stephan Mertens he is the author of The Nature of Computation.