CONTRIBUTORS 



Wildlife photographer 

 JASPER DOEST ("The 

 Natural Moment," p. 6) often 

 travels to foreign lands — Hel- 

 goland, Lapland, Poland — in 

 search of interesting animal 

 subjects. But for the baby 

 grebe pictured in this issue, 

 Doest stayed in his homeland, 

 the Netherlands. See www. 

 doest-photography.com to 

 enjoy more of his images. 



After twenty-five years 

 of far-ranging fieldwork, 

 ELEANOR J. STERLING 



("Blue Planet Blues," 

 p. 29 and "Sold Down the 

 River," p. 40) knows the 

 full spectrum of Earth's 

 waterways well — a knowl- 

 edge she amply poured, as 

 curator, into the latest ex- 

 hibit at the American Mu- 

 seum of Natural History, 

 entitled "Water: H 2 0 = 

 Life." Her expertise on 

 one particular river, the 

 Mekong, shaped her co- 

 authorship of the book 

 Vietnam: A Natural His- 

 tory. She currently directs 

 the Center for Biodiver- 

 sity and Conservation at 

 AMNH and teaches at 

 Columbia University in 

 New York. 



CHRISTOPHER J. MUNDY, 

 SHAWN M. KATHMANN, 

 & GREGORY K. SCHENTER 



("A Special Brew," p. 32) 

 study chemical physics 

 at the Pacific Northwest 

 National Laboratory in 

 Richland, Wishington. Al- 

 though diverse in their re- 

 spective areas of expertise, 

 the trio shares a common 

 bond: a fascination with 

 the elusive nature of water. 

 Mundy, who trained as a 

 theoretical chemist, creates 

 computer models of HtO. 



Top row, left to right: Doest, Sterling, Mundy, Kathmann 

 Middle row, left to right: Schenter, Camhi, Happier, Lawrence 

 Bottom row, left to right: Schwab, Penland, Alwash, Postel 



Kathmann, a physicist, de- 

 veloped a molecular theory 

 for how water condenses, 

 crystallizes, bubbles, and 

 more. Schenter — also a 

 physicist — has studied the 

 chemical reactions of water 

 on a quantum scale. Due to 

 their collaborative efforts, 

 water is less mysterious on 

 the micro level. 



Waters, according to MERRY 

 D. CAMHI ("Sold Down the 

 River" p. 40), have coursed 

 through her entire life: 

 from the chance meeting of 

 her future husband on the 

 mudflats of Shark River in 

 New Jersey to her graduate 

 work on sea turtles to edit- 

 ing Sharks of the Open Ocean 

 ( Wiley-Black well, 2008). 

 She serves as the content 

 coordinator of AMNH s 

 exhibit on water. 



SHARON P. NAPPIER, 

 ROBERT S. LAWRENCE, 

 & KELLOGG J. SCHWAB 



("Dangerous Waters," p. 

 46) coordinated their ef- 

 forts at the Johns Hopkins 

 Bloomberg School of 

 Public Health (JHBSPH) 

 in Baltimore, Maryland in 

 order to highlight some 

 of the imminent dangers 

 to the cleanliness of the 

 world's dwindling fresh- 

 water supplies. Lawrence 

 is the founding director 

 of the Center for a Liv- 

 able Future at JHBSPH. 

 Schwab, director of the 

 Center for Water and 

 Health at JHBSPH, is cur- 

 rently trying to improve 

 methods of detecting no- 

 roviruses. He and Nappier, 

 a graduate student in his 

 laboratory, are also study- 

 ing those and other patho- 



gens in non-native oyster 

 species found throughout 

 the Chesapeake Bay. 



SHEA PENLAND ("When 

 the Seas Come Marching 

 In," p. 50) addresses the 

 current state of affairs in the 

 Mississippi Delta region and 

 reconsiders the prophetic 

 article he wrote for Natural 

 History in February 2005. 

 He is the Director of the 

 Pontchartrain Institute for 

 Environmental Sciences at 

 the University of New 

 Orleans, and the Universi- 

 ty's Braunstein Professor of 

 Petroleum Geology. 



As soon as Saddam Hussein 

 was removed from power, 

 AZZAM ALWASH ("Water 

 at War," p. 56) quit his job 

 as a geologic engineer in 

 California and changed 

 course: he set his sights on 

 restoring the marshlands of 

 Iraq. He continues to make 

 headway on improving 

 the wetlands' health with 

 the Eden Again Project 

 (www.edenagain.org). 



SANDRA L. POSTEL ("Shar- 

 ing the River Out of 

 Eden," p. 60) examines the 

 world through the lens of 

 water — namely, how would 

 the world look without it? 

 Food security, environmen- 

 tal health, and international 

 relations are a few of the 

 touchstones Postel cov- 

 ers here and in her three r 

 books. She runs the Global 

 Witer Policy Project, 

 geared toward sustaining 

 the Connecticut River 

 watershed, and directs the 

 Center for the Environ- 

 ment at Mount Holyoke 

 College in South Hadley, 

 Massachusetts. 



10 



NATURAL HISTORY November 2007 



