Rolf
Gradinger
University of Alaska Fairbanks

Rolf Gradinger is an Professor of Oceanography and Associate Dean at the University of Alaska Fairbanks School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences. During his Masters thesis work at the University of Kiel, Germany, he focused on phytoplankton species distribution patterns in the Greenland Sea (completed 1986). His PhD thesis (also Kiel University) focused on the functional role of heterotrophic nanoflagellates in the Arctic (completed 1999).

During his Post-doc period he started to work on Arctic and Antarctic sea ice communities –- a focus he has kept until today. Since 2001, he has worked at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and was involved in various Arctic research initiatives, including the Shelf-Basin Interaction Study or the Arctic Ocean Diversity project. Rolf's involvement in the Bering Sea Project is through joint work with Bodil Bluhm, Katrin Iken and University of Alaska graduate students on the role of sea ice algae for herbivorous plankton and benthos in the Bering Sea.