SANTA BARBARA –– Two UC Santa Barbara scientists have been awarded Leopold Leadership Fellowships, a prestigious North American program that is focused on communicating scientific research to a wide audience.

Gretchen Hofmann, professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology, and David Lea, professor in the Department of Earth Science, have been selected as two of 19 Leopold Leadership fellows for 2009.

Hofmann is currently studying the impacts of ocean acidification on marine ecosystems. Lea researches the implications of paleoclimatic data for understanding and predicting climate change.

The Leopold Leadership Program is a competitive fellowship for outstanding academic environmental scientists who are actively engaged in outreach to decision-makers and the public about their work. The program is based at Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment. Each year, the program selects up to 20 midcareer academic environmental scientists as fellows.

Fellows will receive two weeks of intensive communication and leadership training in how to deliver information about their research to journalists, policymakers, business leaders, and the public. The fellowship also offers networking and mentoring through the Leadership Network by program advisors, trainers, and past fellows.

The program was created in 1998 by Jane Lubchenco, a leading marine biologist who is the nominee to head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The Leopold Leadership Program is funded by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.