Marine Ecologist Receives MacArthur Genius Award

October 2, 2012

Marine Ecologist Nancy Rabalais was announced as one of the 2012 MacArthur Foundation Fellows. The Fellowship is a $500,000, no-strings-attached grant for individuals who show exceptional creativity in their work and the promise to do more.

Dr. Rabalis is the director of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and carries out research documenting the environmental and economic consequences of hypoxic zones in the Gulf of Mexico. Dr. Rabalis’s work is critical to the creation of strategies for restoring the degraded waters of the Gulf and the Mississippi River basin.

The MacArthur Fellowship is an annual grant program, which recognizes a broad spectrum of high-achieving individuals in fields such as science, medicine, literature, art, journalism, music, economics, filmmaking, mathematics and entrepreneurship. Each of the 23 fellows is bestowed $500,000 without conditions over five years to pursue their insights and ideas for the benefit of the world.