About the Authors

Coastal and Marine Ecosystems & Global Climate Change

Authors

Dr. Victor S. Kennedy
University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science

Dr. Kennedy is a marine ecologist who has spent over 30 years working as a research scientist on the ecology and physiology of aquatic animals. His early training included studying the effects of temperature on survival and physiology of estuarine species. His research in the 1960s helped convince the State of Maryland to revise its regulations governing discharge of heated water from power plants and other industrial facilities into Chesapeake Bay. Beginning in 1989, he used his experience with the effects of temperature on aquatic organisms to write papers and make presentations at scientific meetings on the possible effects of climate change. He is a co-author of the recent assessment for the mid-Atlantic coastal region that appeared in Climate Research and is the lead author of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change's report, "Coastal and Marine Systems and Global Climate Change."

Dr. Kennedy is a Professor at the Horn Point Laboratory of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, where he performs research, directs the Multiscale Experimental Ecosystem Research Center, and teaches graduate students. In addition to his research activities in Chesapeake Bay, he has worked as a marine ecologist in the coastal waters of New Zealand and in the coastal and offshore waters of Newfoundland, Canada. He has had extensive experience as a science editor, spending five years as the Editor of the Transactions of the American Fisheries Society, as well as editing or co-editing six technical books. He served as president of two scientific organizations.

Dr. Robert R. Twilley
University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Dr. Twilley is the Director for Ecology and Environmental Technology at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Dr. Twilley received his B.S. and M.S. (Biology) from East Carolina University, and his Ph.D. (Botany/Systems Ecology) from the University of Florida, after which he completed a postdoctoral fellowship in coastal oceanography at the University of Maryland. His research interests include ecosystem ecology, estuarine and coastal ecosystems; biogeochemistry of mangroves and tropical estuarine ecosystems; and ecosystem management and restoration of coastal regions. Among his various professional activities, Dr. Twilley currently serves on the editorial boards for Mangroves and Salt Marches and Environmental Science and Policy, and he previously served as a guest editor for Ecology and as an associate editor for Estuaries. Dr. Twilley is an active member in several professional societies including the Ecological Society of America, Estuarine Research Federation, Society of Wetland Science, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In addition to serving on the Board of Directors for the Society of Wetland Scientists (1993-97), Dr. Twilley has contributed to 71 publications and received a Distinguished Professor award for the 1999-00 academic year at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

Joan A. Kleypas
National Center for Atmospheric Research

Joan Kleypas specializes in examining how environmental factors control coral reef development at the global scale. She has a bachelor's degree in Marine Biology (Lamar Univ., Texas), and a master's in Marine Ecology (Univ. of South Carolina). She obtained a Ph.D. from James Cook University, as a Fulbright scholar to Australia, where she conducted a reef coring program to examine the causes for differences in coral reef development in the southern Great Barrier Reef. From there she moved to the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Boulder, Colorado, to examine not only how climate affects coral reefs, but also how coral reefs affect climate. Much of this work entailed modeling reef response to sea level and temperature changes since the last ice age. She is currently involved with issues relating to the direct effects of increasing atmospheric CO2 on coral reefs; i.e., how CO2-induced changes in seawater chemistry affect the rates at which reef-building coral and algae secrete their calcium carbonate skeletons. She continues to work at NCAR as an Associate Scientist with Scott Doney, in the broad field of ocean biogeochemistry and its role in the global carbon cycle. Dr. Kleypas has also taught numerous courses in geology, oceanography, and global change as a visiting professor at Colorado College.

Dr. James H. Cowan, Jr.
Louisiana State University

James H. Cowan, Jr. is a Professor in the Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences and the Coastal Fisheries Institute at the Louisiana State University. He received B.Sc. (Biology) and M.Sc. (Biological Oceanography) degrees from Old Dominion University, and M.Sc. (Experimental Statistics) and Ph.D. (Marine Sciences) degrees from the Louisiana State University. Among many other professional activities, he has thrice served on National Research Council study committees and technical review panels concerning fisheries issues, has twice served on the Ocean Sciences Division, Biological Oceanography Review Panel for the National Science Foundation, and has served as a U.S. delegate both to the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) and the Pacific Marine Sciences Organization (PICES). He currently is Chairman of the Reef Fish Stock Assessment Panel and a member of the Standing Scientific and Statistical Committee for the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council. He has served as President of the Early Life History Section, and on the Outstanding Chapter Award and Distinguished Service Award committees for the American Fisheries Society. He has almost 20 years of experience conducting fisheries research in marine and estuarine ecosystems, has authored more than 75 refereed publications in the primary fisheries literature, served four years as an associate editor for Estuaries, the journal of the Estuarine Research Federation, for 6 years as an associate editor for Gulf of Mexico Science, and currently is an associate editor for Transactions of the American Fisheries Society.

Dr. Steven R. Hare
International Pacific Halibut Commission

Dr. Steven Hare is a quantitative biologist with the International Pacific Halibut Commission in Seattle, Washington. His principal duties are to assess the status of the Pacific halibut resource, determine a sustainable harvest level and conduct life history investigations. Dr. Hare obtained his B.S. in Engineering at the University of Michigan and both his M.S. and Ph.D. at the University of Washington in Fisheries Science. His main area of research is fisheries oceanography, in particular the organizing influence of climate on marine resources of the North Pacific. Dr. Hare is a co-discoverer, and was responsible for naming, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, an important mode of Pacific climate variability. In his 20 years as a fisheries biologist, Dr. Hare has worked for the University of Washington and National Marine Fisheries Service. He has also spent considerable time working overseas with stints in Oman and Guinea-Bissau and a tour of duty in the Peace Corps in the Solomon Islands.