Dr. Rita Curtis is the Chief of NOAA Fisheries Service Office of Science and Technology, Economic and Social Analysis Division. Dr. Curtis first began working with NOAA in 1999 as an economist for the Office of Science and Technology. In 1999, she completed her PhD in Agriculture and Resource Economics from the University of Maryland. Beforehand, Dr. Curtis worked at the Pacific Islands Fishery Science Center in Hawaii studying the longline fleet.

Dr. Mark Holliday has a B.S. in Biology from SUNY Stony Brook, a Master’s in Marine and Environmental Science from Long Island University, and a PhD in Marine Studies from the University of Delaware. Growing up around the water, Holiday always knew he wanted to have a career in marine science. He came to NOAA after finishing his Doctorate through the Intergovernmental Personnel Act before being hired as a fisheries statistician. He later became the Chief Financial Officer for the Office of Science and Technology.

Dr. Richard Merrick is Chief Science Administrator and Director of Scientific Programs at NOAA Fisheries. He has a B.S. and Master’s from Clemson University, two Master’s from Oregon State University in Marine Resource Management and Biological Oceanography, and finally a PhD in Fisheries from the University of Washington in Seattle. Merrick began his career with NOAA as a contractor in 1983, working in Alaska and the Arctic. He then moved to the Northeast Fisheries Science Center and continued working for the conservation of marine mammals.

Dr. Joseph Powers was born on February 19, 1949 in Gustine, California. He has earned degrees from the University of California, Davis A.B. Zoology 1971; California State University, Humboldt M.S. Fisheries Biology 1973 ; and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University PhD Fisheries Science 1975. He began his career with National Marine Fisheries Service at the Southwest Fisheries Science Center in 1975. He then moved to the Southeast Fisheries Science Centers in 1979.

Dr. Nancy Thompson was born in September 1949 in Newark, New Jersey. She earned her PhD from the University of Rhode Island. Dr. Thompson worked for NOAA from 1980-2011, serving as the Director at both the Southeast and Northeast Fisheries Science Centers during her career. At the time of this interview in 2016, she was working at the University of South Florida’s College of Marine Science.

Dr. Susan Abbott-Jamieson is a retired anthropologist with the Social Sciences Branch of NOAA, where she worked as the Senior Social Scientist in the Office of Science and Technology in the National Marine Fisheries Service. She joined the Air Force after high school, and later received a B.A. from Idaho State University and a Master’s and PhD. in Anthropology from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

Edward DeMartini was born in San Francisco, California in 1946.His father died when he was four years old, and he was introduced to fishing when he was six by his cousin who acted as a surrogate father at the time. Ed says he was a natural historian at a young age and credits his mother with giving him the latitude to be an avid explorer and sparking his early interest in fish. Ed graduated with a degree in biology from the University of San Francisco in 1968, and a Master’s in Biological Oceanography in 1970.

Robert Humphreys was born in Newport Beach California, April 30, 1953. He grew up fishing in his big backyard, the Pacific Ocean and Newport Beach, California. Bob became a marine biology major at the University of California, Berkeley where he studied leopard sharks and bat rays in Bodega Bay. After graduating with his bachelor's degree, Bob then worked for the California Fish and Game office before heading to Hawaii in 1977. He began working at the NMFS Honolulu Laboratory during that year.

Dr. Richard Methot grew up in western Massachusetts. He attended the University of Washington and received a bachelor'sdegree from the College of Fisheries. Following graduation, Dr. Methot went to Scripps Institution of Oceanography where he earned his Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography in 1981. After a one year postdoc at Bodega Marine Laboratory, he began working for NOAA that same year at the Southwest Fisheries Science Center in LaJolla, CA. In 1988, he moved to the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle, WA.

Jerry Prezioso was born on February 27, 1949 in Brooklyn, New York. He received his undergraduate degree from Northeastern University and his master‟s from the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography. Jerry began working at the NOAA Laboratory in Narragansett, Rhode Island in 1974 and continues to work there as an oceanographer to this day.