The next ten years: People to watch

The world, as you know it, is about to change.

It won't happen overnight, just as the world-changing events you witnessed over the past decade did not happen overnight.

These things take time.

Just as importantly, these things take people.

These are just a handful of the Utahns we think could make a big splash over the next 10 years:

Alejandro Sanchez Alvarado, the Utah developmental biologist who spends his time studying stem cells and worms to understand regeneration.

Dr. Julie Korenberg, who created the most detailed genetic map of Down syndrome in the world, opening up avenues of research for doctors studying cancer, obesity and cardiovascular disease.

Gabe Epperson, the fresh-faced Envision Utah planner, who already has taken on the task of saving the Jordan River.

West Valley Mayor Mike Winder and West Jordan Mayor Melissa Johnson, who took control of the state's second- and fourth-largest cities, respectively, before their 40th birthdays.

Mark Porter, the University of Utah researcher who is working on a way to use saliva to diagnose diseases.

Matthew Ivan Bennett, Plan-B Theatre's resident playwright.

Dallas Hanks, Jeff Muhs, and the alternative energy gurus at Utah State University who are harvesting harmful phosphates from waste lagoons outside of Logan and safflower from road sides and using them to power automobiles.

Ruby Chacon, the Salt Lake City artist whose passion for her craft is rivaled only by her passion for her growing, west-side neighborhood.

Ben McAdams, the Columbia-educated lawyer who, at age 35, just won election to the Utah Senate.

There are others, the Mitt Romneys and Jon Huntsmans of the world, whose names are well-known even if their places in history are not.

Isaac Russell, the teenage Utah County musician currently touring the country in support of his Columbia Records debut.

Then, of course, there are the outliers, the unknown, the university students discussing the future in dorm rooms and cafes, the computer whizzes clicking away in their parents' basements, the children shooting free throws in the park, who will lead revolutions of the mind and the body and the soul.

Keep your eyes peeled. Watch for them.

The only thing we can say with certainty is that the coming decade, like the last one, will be filled with change.

— Aaron Falk