Stephen R. Carpenter

Stephen Russell Carpenter (born July 5, 1952) is an American lake ecologist who focuses on lake eutrophication which is the over-enrichment of lake ecosystems leading to toxic blooms of micro-organisms and fish kills.

Early life Born in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, his father, Richard, a chemist, became the Director of the National Academies’ Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology, so Carpenter was immersed in science at a young age. In his youth, Carpenter spent his summers on his grandfather's farm in Missouri. During this time he and his relatives enjoyed fishing, hunting and camping. “Hiking, camping, fishing, and hunting all come together in ecology,” he says. “I was really excited when I discovered there was a way to get paid for being a scientist outdoors.”

Education His interest in ecology was sparked during his undergraduate program at Amherst College. After his sophomore year, Carpenter worked for the summer on a survey of tree cover in Glacier National Park. Carpenter performed undergraduate research in the Fort River of Massachusetts on the primary production of macrophytes under the instruction of Stuart Fisher, an aquatic ecosystem scientist. He received a B.A. in biology in 1974 and the board for the Stockholm Resilience Centre. As of 2021, he is the co-editor in chief of the journal Ecosystems. In 2000-2005 he was co-chair of the Scenarios Working Group of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. He led the North Temperate Lakes research site of the Long Term Ecological Research Network program at the University of Wisconsin in 1999-2009. He is a former president of the Ecological Society of America. As of 2011, Carpenter has published 5 books and about 450 scientific papers, book chapters, reviewed reports and commentaries.

Awards Carpenter is the 2011 laureate of the Stockholm Water Prize for his research on how lake ecosystems are affected by their surrounding landscape and by human activities such as nutrient loading, fishing, and introductions of exotic species. His other awards include a Pew Fellowship in Conservation and Environment, the Naumann-Thienemann medal of the International Society of Limnology in 2007 for "research that has built bridges between ecological theory, ecosystem experiments, and management of complex limnological problems" and the work that "has elucidated the importance of the trophic cascade and regime shifts in the management of lakes", the G. Evelyn Hutchinson Award in 1999 from the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography, the Robert H. MacArthur Award in 2000 and Fellow in 2012 from the Ecological Society of America, the Excellence in Ecology Prize (ECI Prize) in 2000 from the Ecology Institute for limnetic ecology, and the Ramon Margalef Prize in Ecology in 2018 from the Generalitat de Catalunya. In 2001, Carpenter was also awarded membership in the US National Academy of Sciences and Foreign Membership of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and 2006 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2022 he was also awarded the Blue Planet Prize.

Research Carpenter's research interest is in whole-ecosystem experiments and adaptive ecosystem management in freshwaters. Specific topics include: trophic cascades and their effects on production and nutrient cycling; contaminant cycles; freshwater fisheries; eutrophication; nonpoint pollution; ecological economics of freshwater; resilience of social-ecological systems; and early warnings of collapse in complex systems. "Eutrophication is a significant environmental problem that can impact humans on a recreational, economic, and even public health level,” says Carpenter, “and it's likely to intensify in the coming decades due to increases in human population, demand for more food, land conversion, and fertilizer use."

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