Robert Richmond

Research Professor, Kewalo Marine Laboratory

University of Hawaii, Manoa

Dr. Bob Richmond has spent most of his professional career studying coral reef ecosystems in both the Caribbean and the Pacific. He began his studies in the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Grenadines, and since 1980, has worked extensively throughout Micronesia, from the Marshall Islands to Palau. He served as Chief Scientist for a World Conservation Union-sponsored mission to the Galapagos Islands, and has assisted numerous Pacific Islands in dealing with marine resource and related conservation issues. He is the scientific advisor to the All-Islands Group of the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force, and served as a Council Member for the International Society for Reef Studies. He works closely with island community-based organizations, traditional leaders and stakeholders, and has trained more than 30 Pacific Islanders in his laboratory over the years. His research interests include coral reef ecology, marine conservation biology, ecotoxicology and integration of traditional management systems with modern approaches to resource use and protection.

He recently joined the faculty of the Kewalo Marine Laboratory, University of Hawaii and also serves as Professor of Marine Biology at the University of Guam Marine Laboratory, where he has served on the faculty since 1986, and as Director from 1988 - 1991. He received a B.S. in Biology/Geology with High Distinction from the University of Rochester in 1976, an M.S. in Marine Environmental Sciences from the Marine Sciences Research Center, State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook, in 1982 and a Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from the Department of Ecology and Evolution, SUNY at Stony Brook, in 1983. Following completion of his graduate work, he received two postdoctoral fellowships from the Smithsonian Institution and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.