March 5th-6th, 2020
Salk Institute for Biological Studies and San Diego Botanic Garden

Human activities have resulted in a continuous increase of CO2 in the earth’s atmosphere. This increase is already causing drastic alterations of the earth’s climate. At the same time, population growth will have resulted in 11 billion people by the end of the century, whose demands require resilient (agro)ecosystems to produce healthy food and for biodiversity to survive and thrive. There is little time nor space to address the multiple challenges driving climate change, agriculture, and ecosystem degradation separately. Plant, soil, and ocean-based approaches are among the prime candidates for global CO2 drawdown, but these may compete with agriculture and ecosystems. This symposium will be a forum to discuss and explore these grand challenges and their potential global solutions. We have invited a set of outstanding speakers who work across plant science, soil science, ocean science, atmospheric science, ecology and carbon sequestration. On the first day, we will lay out the science with our expert scientists in four different thematic sessions featuring presentations and podium discussions. On the second day, we aim to explore these approaches with the public, social scientists, press and civic arena leadership.

Hosts:
Wolfgang Busch
Associate Professor
Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology Laboratory
Integrative Biology Laboratory

Joseph Noel
Professor and Director
Jack H. Skirball Center for Chemical Biology and Proteomics
Arthur and Julie Woodrow Chair