About the Author

Dr. George M. Woodwell is the founder of the Woods Hole Research Center. He was also the founder and director of the Ecosystems Center of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole and a senior scientist at Brookhaven National Laboratory. He was a founding trustee of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a founding trustee of the World Resources Institute, a founder of the Environmental Defense Fund, and former president of the Ecological Society of America. Dr. Woodwell is the author of more than three hundred papers and books on ecology.