Ocean doom, gloom or hope?

As a counter to depressing news of coral bleaching, plastic pollution and endangered species, Nancy Knowlton described recent successes in marine conservation – and explain why we need to talk about them more often.

Nancy Knowlton, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History

Nancy has devoted her life to studying, celebrating and striving to protect marine life. A coral reef biologist and scientific leader of the Census of Marine Life, her studies led to the now widespread recognition that marine diversity estimates are probably too low by a factor of ten. She is the Sant Chair for Marine Science at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, founder of the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography of the University of California, San Diego, co-originator of #OceanOptimism and the Earth Optimism Summits and a member of the US National Academy of Sciences.