Cristina Hansell is director of the NIS Nonproliferation Program and an adjunct professor at the Monterey Institute. She is a Ph.D. candidate in International Affairs at the University of California at San Diego, specializing in local government and center-region relations in Russia and China. She received an M.A. in Russian and Chinese history at the University of Hawaii in 1990 and graduated magna cum laude with an A.B. in Soviet Studies from Harvard University in 1987. Before coming to the Monterey Institute, she taught politics courses at Grossmont College in El Cajon, California. She has also worked as an intern aiding Eastern European privatization programs while at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Her areas of expertise include Russian civilian and naval nuclear reactors, foreign nonproliferation assistance to Russia, and developments at the Russian Federal Atomic Energy Agency, as well as HEU minimization issues worldwide. Her recent writings include "Nuclear Power Broker," in the September/October 2007 edition of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (co-author); "Developing HEU Guidelines," presented at the September 2007 Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors (RERTR) conference in Prague; "No Place for Nuclear Secrets," an op-ed in the Moscow Times (June 22, 2007); and "Russian Nuclear-Powered Submarine Dismantlement and Related Activities: A Critique."