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The final installment of The Explorers 50 Speaker Series, supported by Rolex, returns on Wednesday, December 14th at 7 pm with the “Protectors”. This episode brings together experts from multiple disciplines who have explored microscopic frontiers to shed light on and protect our world’s endangered species and places. The panel discussion will be moderated by EC 50 2021 honoree Brandi DeCarli and will dive into the ways exploration has been changed by the science of conservation, extinction, and the importance of sharing these discoveries with communities.

This event is entirely virtual. Streaming live here on explorers.org, our YouTube Channel, and our Facebook Live — Wednesday, December 14th at 7:00 pm ET.

Speakers

Sarah K. Carmichael

Dr. Sarah Carmichael FN’16 is a geochemist who studies how water reacts with rocks, in both ancient and modern environments. Her areas of expertise include the geochemistry of mass extinctions, the interactions between microbes and minerals in caves, and the interplay between microbes, water, and ore deposits. Her goal is to get the rocks to “tell their stories,” which starts with intense fieldwork wherever necessary- from the mountains in the Gobi Altai in Mongolia, to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in the Alvin submersible, the flanks of volcanoes in Tanzania, and the depths of caves in the southern Appalachians – and ends with a variety of high-tech laboratory techniques, allowing the story to be told from the kilometer scale to the molecular scale.

Andrés Alfonso Ruzo-Callejas

Andrés Ruzo Callejas is a geothermal scientist, conservationist, educator, and communicator, working to connect people with nature. He is best known for his work on Peru’s Boiling River of the Amazon, where in 2011 he became the first geoscientist to receive the shamanic blessing to study this sacred site. He is the Founder and Director of the Boiling River Project, a nonprofit whose mission is to understand, protect, and advocate for the Boiling River and geothermal sites across the globe. His team of over 50 collaborators brings together science, art, traditional knowledge, and interdisciplinary education. Andrés is a NatGeo Explorer and host, and a TED MainStage Speaker and Author. He holds degrees in Geology and Finance, and is currently finishing his PhD (focus: Geothermal Systems).

Natalie Schmitt

Natalie is an empathetic ecologist, conservation geneticist, and documentary presenter, deeply passionate about protecting biodiversity using hard science, public education, and community empowerment. Studying elusive, endangered species, like snow leopard and Antarctic whales, she has empowered grass-roots conservation, and enabled policy education and management improvement at various scales, including that of the International Whaling Commission. Natalie is developing a leading-edge technology to detect DNA from minute biological samples in real time, error-free, at low cost and easy-to-use. She leads an extremely skilled, synergic team of geneticists, conservationists, communicators, business partners, and institutions to develop this technology. WildTechDNA will categorically revolutionize the way how customs, law-enforcement, field monitoring practices, citizen science, and locally based conservation are conducted around the world.