David Karl

David Karl is the Victor and Peggy Brandstrom Pavel Professor of Microbial Oceanography and Director of the Daniel K. Inouye Center for Microbial Oceanography: Research and Education (C-MORE) at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, leading the Laboratory for Microbial Oceanography within the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST). Dr. Karl has spent more than 1,000 days conducting research at sea including 23 expeditions to Antarctica. In 1988 he co-founded the Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT) program that has conducted sustained physical, biogeochemical and microbial measurements and experiments at Station ALOHA on approximately monthly intervals for the past 35 years. In 2006, Dr. Karl led a team of scientists in the establishment of The Center for Microbial Oceanography: Research and Education (C-MORE) – a new NSF-supported Science and Technology Center that conducts collaborative research on marine microorganisms from genomes to biomes, and has a vital training mission to help prepare the next generation of microbial oceanographers. He is also the co-director of the The Simons Collaboration on Ocean Processes and Ecology (SCOPE) program, which aims to advance our understanding of the biology, biogeochemistry, ecology and evolution of microbial processes at Station ALOHA.

Dr. Karl holds a PhD from the University of California, San Diego, Scripps Institution of Oceanography. received several awards and honors including the G. Evelyn Hutchinson Medal from the American Society for Limnology and Oceanography, the Henry Bryant Bigelow Medal from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Alexander Agassiz Medal from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and an honorary D.Sc. degree from the University of Chicago. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and the American Academy of Microbiology, and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.

Visit the SOEST website for more information about his work.

“I am thrilled to be part of the OBVI project.  The mission is timely, important and one of the most challenging in all of ocean science for understanding the current and future states of our planet.  I look forward to meaningful collaborations and unexpected discoveries.”