She was an astrobiologist. But so what? There are plenty of real engineers who are tinkering with over-unity nonsense. While this ultra-sonic charging isn't as dumb as perpetual motion it does appear to be dumb.
Honestly Computer Science used to be so open to outsiders, now it's "If you don't have a degree we don't believe you."
That's really bad. Especially considering the alternative theory involves her pulling the wool over the eyes of both AH and Marissa Mayer for ten million dollars.
What's she's doing has nothing to do with computer science.
You're right that people shouldn't be dismissing her work because of her qualifications and previous work experience but that works both ways - she doesn't magically gain credibillity just because she used to work at someplace or other.
As for working at NASA, she was doing hard science research on a type of spectrography, for which she was given multiple awards by NASA Ames Rearch Center. So yes, I do consider the multitude of indications of her intelligence to be directly relevant.
This negativity reeks of "she's not part of our West Coast club" and people with no knowledge of the technology are making blanket assertions that its impossible. That's wrong.
If this company had a valley pedigree and a male founder, I'm sure I'd be reading all about the amazing self-charging forthcoming revolution.
This thread would be far more insulting if she were male.
The problem has nothing to do with her being UPenn (I have no fucking clue about US geography or state rivalries) or not being in some club (which she clearly is part of - look at where she's raised $10 million from).
It's to do with people being sceptical of the physics. This device is implausible at best.