PRESENTER.
Dr. Richard W. (Rick) Spinrad is a Professor of Oceanography at Oregon State University (OSU), member of the Ocean Studies Board of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, and Vice-Chair of the U.S. National Committee for the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development. In 2016 he retired as Chief Scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), where he had been appointed by President Barack Obama in 2014. Among his accomplishments, Dr. Spinrad was a co-lead of the White House Committee that developed the nation’s first set of ocean research priorities and oversaw the revamping of NOAA’s research enterprise.