Nicholas Institute Board of Advisors

Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Dr. Jane Lubchenco is an environmental scientist and marine ecologist who is actively engaged in teaching, research, synthesis and communication of scientific knowledge. She was born and grew up in Denver, one of six daughters of two physicians. She graduated from Colorado College with a B.A. in biology. During college, she fell in love with the ocean and its critters during a summer course in invertebrate zoology at Woods Hole, Massachusetts. She has worked on and around oceans ever since. She received a Master's Degree from the University of Washington and a Ph.D. from Harvard University, both in marine ecology.

Jane was an assistant professor at Harvard University for two years before moving with her husband, marine ecologist Bruce Menge, to Oregon State University. Bruce and Jane pioneered an arrangement that enabled each to teach and do research but also devote significant amounts of time to their young children. Each of them held a part-time but tenure-track position at OSU for 13 years. Each has been full time since 1989.

Jane's myriad contributions to OSU have been recognized with two titles: Wayne and Gladys Valley Professor of Marine Biology and Distinguished Professor of Zoology. Her expertise includes biodiversity, climate change, sustainability science, coastal marine ecosystems, the state of the oceans and of the planet.
Jane and Bruce lead an interdisciplinary team of scientists who study the near-shore portion of the marine ecosystem off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and California.The team is called PISCO (the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans; www.piscoweb.org). With over $70 million in funding over ten years, the team from OSU, Stanford's Hopkins Marine Station, and the University of California at Santa Barbara and at Santa Cruz is learning how the ecosystem works and how it is changing. PISCO conducts interdisciplinary research, offers interdisciplinary courses, and shares new discoveries directly with interested citizens, policy makers, managers and the media.

Bruce and Jane also have active collaborative research programs with colleagues and students in New Zealand, Chile and South Africa.

Jane actively promotes science and communicates scientific knowledge in international and national arenas. She is President of the International Council for Science (the first woman president in the 70+ year-old organization). She has also served as President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and of the Ecological Society of America. She is serving a second term on the National Science Board, having been twice nominated by President Clinton and twice confirmed by the U.S. Senate). She is often invited to testify before Congress, addresses the United Nations, or provide scientific advice to the White House, federal and international agencies, non-governmental organizations, religious leaders and leaders of business and industry. She co-chairs Oregon Governor Kulongoski's Advisory Group on Global Warming that will recommend actions the state should take to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.

Jane founded and co-leads the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program that teaches outstanding academic environmental scientists to be more effective communicators of scientific information to the public, policy makers, the media and the private sector. Her scientific contributions in ecology are widely recognized. 8 of her publications have been named Science Citation Classic Papers. She is an elected member of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the European Academy of Sciences and a Foreign Member of the Royal Society of London.
She served on the Pew Oceans Commission. She is a Director or Trustee of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, SeaWeb and Environmental Defense. She is Trustee Emerita of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and a former Trustee of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Beijer International Institute for Ecological Economics and the World Resources Institute.

Jane has received numerous awards including a MacArthur Fellowship, a Pew Fellowship, eight honorary degrees (including one from Princeton University), the 2002 Heinz Award in the Environment, the 2003 Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest, the 2004 Distinguished Scientist Award from the American Institute of Biological Sciences. She was recently honored with the 2004 Environmental Law Institute Award, the first scientist to receive this honor.