Jane Lubchenco is a highly cited, multi-award winning, world-recognized marine ecologist and significant figure in environmental science and sustainability. She has improved management techniques, advanced studies in coastal ecosystems, shaped organizations and policies and has brought enormous attention to the threat of climate change. She helped to shape the field of ecology and made it useful to society.
During her time in college, she did numerous studies in the field of ecology with a main focus on the rocky marine seashore systems. Many of her studies were assisted by her husband, Bruce Menge. She graduated from Harvard university in 1975 with a Ph.D. in marine ecology. Dr. Lubchenco and her husband both made significant contributions to the world and understanding of marine biology and ecosystems.
Jane Lubchenco, as mentioned before, had a main focus on New England rocky seashore ecosystems throughout her college years. Her research of these shorelines looked to understand the role of herbivores, competition among seaweeds and the defense systems seaweed have against herbivores. She included numerous animals into her system equation to better understand predation and competition within the intertidal ecosystem. This is further explained in her and her husband's paper, "Community Development and Persistence in a Low Rocky Intertidal Zone", which also won the George Mercer Award in 1979.
She made history in 2009 when she became the first woman to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Here, she helped with management of the U.S. fisheries and damage to aquatic ecosystems, including oil spills, as she aided in the Deepwater Horizon Disaster in 2010. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill was the worst and largest marine oil spill in history, as it released over 100 million gallons of oil into the ocean after an explosion occurred at the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform. After tackling this immense challenge, Jane Lubchenco and other researchers wrote a paper titled "Science in support of the Deepwater Horizon Response", which gave several suggestions for how to better prepare for future oil spills. She discussed developing new technologies for better response times and better oil mechanisms, and advocated becoming more informed on oil and its impacts. Her contributions as administrator of NOAA have carried on well after her leave of the position as she shaped many climate and ocean policies, and advanced the engagement of the government with climate services.
Not only did Dr. Lubchenco make significant contributions to science and management on U.S. soil, but she also made a significant impact all around the world. She worked with several governments, industries, universities and organizations during her time as the U.S. Science Envoy for the Ocean, creating important changes and relationships. In China and Indonesia, she was able to identify pathways for better management of their fisheries, prompting healthier oceans. In Africa, she worked with the government on the education and training of young scientists, creating a program, run by the Ocean Foundation, that measures ocean acidification (OA).
Jane Lubchenco has numerous awards for her outstanding achievements, commitment towards bettering the oceans, management practices and foreign relations, and being a significantly important figure in the science of ecology. She is the recipient of the Public Welfare Medal, the most prestigious honor of the National Academy of Sciences, and the Public Service Award of the US Coast Guard, which is its highest civilian honor. She sat as president for many organizations as well including the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the International Council for Science. She has 19 honorary doctorates, has been inducted into the Women in Science and Technology Hall of Fame, and is considered one of the most highly cited ecologists in the world.
Jane Lubchenco has also left an extraordinary legacy behind in the science field. She created a turning point in sustainability science during her speech at the American Association for the Advancement of Science presidential address in 1997. Her speech explained how communication is needed among scientists in order to better understand our natural world and its needs and emphasized the need to communicate with the public to help build public trust and close the knowledge gap between scientists and the public. She helped to spread her knowledge by educating and inspiring younger scientists in various programs and courses, like her "Marine Science and Policy" graduate course. She has also co-founded several organizations, such as PISCO, which is a research consortium furthering coastal research, and the Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea (COMPASS), which is helping to enhance communication of scientific knowledge.
Jane Lubchenco also left a significant legacy at NOAA, where she strengthened science all together and she strengthened the use of scientific knowledge and communication in policy making and management. Her contributions to science has left an incredible wake behind her, as she showed a different perspective to how science and management should be handled and helped bring awareness to the importance of understanding the world in which we live and allowing everyone to be able to speak their mind on the subject.