明日之星：未来的40位40岁以下商界精英

丹尼尔•方

• 年龄：25岁

• 头衔：联合创始人兼首席科学家

• 公司：光帆能源（LightSail Energy）

如果丹尼尔•方是个虚构的人物，她的存在会不合常理。她住在一座经过翻新的消防站，12岁开始上大学，致力于提高绿色能源的可行性，还吸引了许多世界上最伟大的思想家的关注。光帆能源（LightSail Energy）的技术代表了一种新的储能方式，公司称这种方式更廉价且更高效——可保存70%的存储电荷，远远高于现有的设备。储能问题一直是风能和太阳能等能源产业面临的一个巨大障碍，因为这些能源只能在一天的特定时段采集。如果这种方式有效，光帆能源的解决方案将“使可再生能源更实用，而且将使可再生能源首次成为主流能源，”光帆能源早期投资者维诺德•科斯拉表示。他并不是唯一支持该公司的名人。比尔盖茨和彼得•泰尔也是这家公司董事会的成员，帮助这家初创公司融资超过5,000万美元。开着特斯拉（Tesla）电动车、带着谷歌眼镜（Google Glass）的方住在消防站里，那里曾经是她公司的总部。她说，希望在太空举办自己的40岁生日派对。不可能？不见得。——安妮•范德尔梅  

Danielle Fong

• Age: 25

• Title: Cofounder and chief scientist

• Company: LightSail Energy

If Danielle Fong were a fictional character, she wouldn't be plausible. She lives in a refurbished fire station, started college at age 12, and has a plan to boost the viability of green energy that has attracted attention from some of the world's greatest thinkers. LightSail's technology represents a new take on energy storage that it says will be cheaper and more efficient -- retaining some 70% of a stored charge, much higher than what's possible with existing equipment. Energy storage is a serious hurdle for power sources such as wind and solar, which can only be harvested for part of the day. If it works, LightSail's solution could "make renewable energy practical and mainstream for the first time," says Vinod Khosla, an early investor in LightSail. He's not the only luminary backing the company. Bill Gates and Peter Thiel are also on board, helping boost the startup's funding to more than $50 million. Fong, who drives a Tesla and uses Google Glass, lives in the firehouse that was her company's original headquarters and says she'd like to throw her 40th birthday party "in space." Far-fetched? Maybe not. -Anne VanderMey