Dr. Margaret S. Leinen in January 2007 became the Chief Science Officer for Climos, Inc., a San Francisco-based company pursuing promising natural processes to help mitigate climate change. Previously, she had served since January 2000 as the Assistant Director for Geosciences at the National Science Foundation; and earlier, as Dean of the Graduate School of Oceanography and Vice Provost for Marine and Environmental Programs at the University of Rhode Island. She also was Interim Dean in the College of the Environment and Life Sciences. Dr. Leinen spent her entire academic career at the University of Rhode Island, one of the country's top institutions for marine studies. She is a well-known researcher in paleo-oceanography and paleo-climatology, with research focusing on ocean sediments and their relationship to global biogeochemical cycles and the history of the Earth's climate. In 1983, on a dive in the deep-water submersible, DSRV ALVIN, off the coast of Washington, Dr. Leinen was the first to discover high-temperature, volcanic vents at depth on the Juan de Fuca Ridge. The "black smokers" that characterize these vents contain unique varieties of "chemosynthetic" life (organisms that depend on inorganic molecules as a source of energy rather than sunlight). Dr. Leinen received her B.S. degree (1969) in Geology from the University of Illinois; her M.S. degree (1975) in Geological Oceanography from Oregon State University; and her Ph.D. degree (1980) in Geological Oceanography from the University of Rhode Island. She is past president of The Oceanography Society. She served on the Board of Governors of the Joint Oceanographic Institutions, Inc., and on the Ocean Research Advisory Council. Dr. Leinen also served as the Vice Chair of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme and on the Board on Global Change of the National Research Council/National Academy of Sciences.