Author Bios

The Great Smoky Mountains Association is a nonprofit educational organization founded in 1953 and headquartered in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, in the heart of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. As the official nonprofit partner of Great Smoky Mountains National Park — the most visited national park in the United States — the Association supports the park’s educational,…

Sandrine Dixson-Decleve is a Belgian sustainability leader, policy expert, and co-president of the Club of Rome, one of the world’s most influential think tanks working on global environmental and social challenges. With a career spanning more than three decades in sustainability, energy policy, and climate governance, she has worked at the intersection of business, government,…

Justin Schmidt is an American entomologist and research scientist whose career has focused on the ecology and chemistry of insect venoms, with a particular emphasis on the stinging Hymenoptera — bees, wasps, and ants. He spent much of his career at the Carl Hayden Bee Research Center in Tucson, Arizona, and has been affiliated with…

Valerie Trouet is a Belgian-American dendrochronologist — a scientist who studies tree rings to reconstruct past climates and ecological conditions — and a professor at the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona. Born in Belgium, she pursued her education and early career in Europe before moving to the United States, where she…

Tristan Gooley is a British naturalist, author, and navigator who has developed an international reputation as the foremost expert on natural navigation — the art of finding one’s way using clues from the sun, moon, stars, plants, animals, and landscape. He is the only living person known to have both sailed and flown solo across…

Michelle Feynman is an American editor and the daughter of the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard P. Feynman and his third wife Gweneth Howarth. Growing up as the child of one of the twentieth century’s most beloved scientists, she developed a deep familiarity with both her father’s remarkable personality and his extraordinary correspondence — a collection…

David L. Goodstein is an American physicist and science historian who spent the majority of his career at the California Institute of Technology, where he served as Vice Provost and Professor of Physics and Applied Physics. A distinguished educator and researcher, Goodstein was for many years the scientific director of the Feynman Lectures Project and…

Roman Krznaric is a British cultural thinker, philosopher, and author whose work explores the transformative possibilities of empathy, long-term thinking, and the art of living well. Born in Australia and educated at Oxford, Cambridge, and the London School of Economics, Krznaric co-founded the School of Life in London and has been a faculty member at…

Gary Ferguson is an American nature writer and the author of more than two dozen books on the natural world, wilderness, and the relationship between wild places and the human spirit. Based in Montana, Ferguson has devoted his career to exploring the landscapes of the American West — particularly Wyoming, the Rockies, and the Greater…

Marina Richie is an American nature writer and wildlife conservation journalist whose work explores the lives of wild animals and the efforts of scientists and advocates working to protect them. With a background in environmental writing and reporting, Richie has contributed to magazines, newspapers, and conservation publications across the country, developing a reputation for combining…