Professor Mike brings oceans of wisdom, experience, and passion for seaweed aquaculture to HCAI. Juggling roles as family man (eight kids!), teacher, lab manager, and business entrepreneur, Mike is always busy. Now as co-founder of Harmony Coast Aquaculture Institute and Harmony Coast Sea Farm, he is discovering new ways to achieve work/life balance. As an experimental ecologist he has pioneered investigations into how habitat-forming species of seaweed (kelp) regulates the ecology and evolution of their associated communities. Through research that examines dynamics such as herbivory, competition, disturbance, reproduction and photosynthetic physiology, Mike studies how physiological, ecological, and genetic processes affect the productivity, structure, and diversity of kelp forest communities. His research extends from the microscopic to global scales, and from evolutionary ecology to the present time. He is uniquely qualified to help HCAI pave the way to new food production methods that help humanity, California coastal marine ecosystems, and the planet.