Kenneth "Ken" Owen Buesseler (born 1959)[1] is an American marine radiochemist. He is a senior scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Kenneth Owen Buesseler | |
---|---|
Born | 1959 |
Nationality | American |
Alma mater | University of California, San Diego, Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
Known for | Research on marine radiation effects, Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Radiochemistry, Marine science |
Institutions | Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution |
Buesseler studied biochemistry and cell biology at the University of California, San Diego, where he obtained a BA in 1981. In 1986 he obtained his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.[2]
Since 1983 he has spent the largest part of his career at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where he became a senior scientist in 2000.[3] He is best known for his research on the marine radiation effects from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, where he went on a scientific expedition shortly after the disaster.[4][5] He has measured specific caesium levels since. He has also monitored the effects on the coast of the western United States.[6] Buesseler has criticized the lack of a federal agency looking into the risks of marine radiation contamination in the United States.[7] Buesseler previously did research on the effects of nuclear weapons testing and the effects of the Chernobyl disaster on the Black Sea.[8]
Buesseler was elected a fellow of the American Geophysical Union in 2009.[9] He was elected a foreign member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2013.[10] He was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2018.[11] Buesseler was cited by the Times Higher Education as the top cited oceanographer for the decade 2000 to 2010.[12]