Book Sylvia Earle

Ocean explorer Sylvia Earle was the first person to serve as chief scientist at NOAA and has worked with National Geographic as an Explorer in Residence, now Explorer at Large, since 1998. That same year Time magazine named the American marine biologist its first Hero for the Planet. Her research career runs from a Harvard fellowship and work at the University of California, Berkeley to curating phycology at the California Academy of Sciences, and in 1970 she led the first all-female team of aquanauts living underwater in the Tektite II habitat. She founded the deep-sea engineering firm DOER Marine and Mission Blue, the ocean conservation effort that grew from her 2009 TED Prize. Her honors include the National Geographic Hubbard Medal, the Princess of Asturias Award for Concord, the Carl Sagan Award for Public Understanding of Science, the Patron's Medal, the Rachel Carson Award and a place in the National Women's Hall of Fame, and the Library of Congress counts her among its Living Legends. In 2024 she received the Ken Burns American Heritage Prize. She wrote Blue Hope: Exploring and Caring for Earth's Magnificent Ocean and was featured in the 2021 Netflix documentary Seaspiracy.