Charles S HopkinsonProfessor Charles Hopkinson is a coastal ecosystem biogeochemist at the University of Georgia, Athens, USA. His research interests focus on carbon and nitrogen cycling of coastal systems and how the metabolism of these ecosystems at the land-sea inteface are affected by climate variability, climate change and human activities in watersheds. Recently he has been examining the importance of blue carbon, organic carbon that is buried in coastal wetlands, on the global CO2 budget. While small in areal extent coastal ecosystems have the capacity to sequester almost a tenth of annual CO2 emissions to the atmosphere. Yet these ecosystems are threatened by increases in sea-level rise, declining sediment inputs from watersheds of the world, and direct human activities that convert them to other land uses. Charles was the founding lead investigator of the Plum Island Ecosystems Land-Margin Ecosystem Research program and the Long-term Ecological Research programs. He was the Director of the Georgia Sea Grant College program for 7 years. While Director he established a new resilient coastal communities research and outreach initiative that garnered two prestigious awards - the National Sea Grant Superior Outreach Programming Award, from the National Sea Grant Extension network, and the University Economic Development Association Award of Excellence, from the University of Georgia. He currently serves on a USA National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine committee examining carbon dioxide removal and sequestration technologies. He is also on the Science and Engineering Advisory Committee for the Water Institute of the Gulf, an organization that works closely with the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Advisory Council. He has been a co-editor-in-chief of the journal, Wetlands Ecology and Management, for over a decade. Read More Read Less