Ove Hoegh-Guldberg is currently Professor of Marine Studies and Director of the Global Change Institute at The University of Queensland. Ove has held academic positions at UCLA, Stanford University, The University of Sydney and The University of Queensland and is currently a member of the Australian Climate Group; the Royal Society (London) Marine Advisory Network; and the Board of Editing Reviewers at Science Magazine. He also heads a large research laboratory (over 30 researchers & students) that focuses on how global warming and ocean acidification are affecting and will affect coral reefs now and into the future.

Ove completed his BSc Hons at the University of Sydney and PhD at UCLA in 1989, and has spent the past 20 years working on climate change issues within marine ecosystems. He was recognised in 1999 with the Eureka Prize in 1999 for “ground-breaking research into the physiological basis of coral bleaching”. Ove’s published works include over 180 refereed publications and book chapters. Three of his publications are now the 1st, 4th and 6th most cited works over the past 10 years in the area of “climate change”. Two of these papers are also the 1st and 2nd most cited papers over the past 10 years in the area of “coral reefs”: 649 (Hoegh-Guldberg 1999) and 426 (Hughes et al. 2003). His recent Science paper in Dec 2007 is now ISI’s hottest paper (most cited over the past two years) in the both the area of “climate change” and “ocean acidification” (cited 192 times in <24 months). In 2008, he became a Queensland Smart State Premier’s Fellow.

Ove is also a regular contributor to the media, with his work over the past 12 months featuring in the ABC (Catalyst), BBC (with Sir David Attenborough) and NBC (with Tom Brokaw), reaching over 15 million people in Australia, the UK and the USA. In his role as Deputy Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, and as Coordinator for the Australasian Centre for Excellence and Chair of the Bleaching Working Group within the World Bank-Global Environment Facility Coral Reef Targeted Research project. Hoegh-Guldberg interacts with a wide array of national and international scientific networks that focus on the challenges that climate change poses to the health of the world’s oceans.

In addition to his work as a university academic, Ove has been advisor to numerous organisations including the Royal Society (London), Greenpeace, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Rio Tinto Aluminium, the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, The World Bank, UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, NOAA and the Australian Government on the issue of coral reefs and climate change.   Ove Hoegh-Guldberg become the Queensland Smart State Premier’s Fellow in 2009, a position he will hold for 5 years.