Meet Sharon Levy

In her April 2011 SftPublic lecture Conservation Lessons from Ice Age Extinctions, science author Sharon Levy described the relationship between large animal extinctions in the Ice Age and the "epidemic" of species extinctions we are witnessing today.

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In Sharon Levy's 2011 book, Once and Future Giants: What Ice-Age Extinctions Tell Us about the Fate of Earth's Largest Animals she investigates the impact of humans on large beasts and their ecological systems in two very different epochs and evaluates competing theories regarding the human role in extinctions in prehistoric and contemporary eras. This book is an important resource for those concerned about the human contribution to animal extinctions.

After receiving her MS in Environmental Toxicology at Oregon State University, Ms. Levy shifted from the lab bench to science writing. And she has been a very productive and successful writer indeed. Ms. Levy is a contributing editor at OnEarth magazine, and she writes regularly for National Wildlife, BioScience, Audubon and New Scientist. Her work has appeared in many other top science magazines, such as Natural History, Nature, Wildlife Conservation, High Country News and Discovery Channel Online. A list of her work can be found on the Sharon Levy website articles page. She has written about a wide range of environmental concerns: from the role of top predators in maintaining ecosystems, sewage recycling, bioengineered mosquitoes.

Ms. Levy excels at raising public awareness about the necessity of preserving wildlife and biodiversity for the survival of the planet. Levy describes particularly well the ways in which even subtle changes in an ecosystem can have widespread effects, both on the local level and on life well beyond a fixed geographic area.