David R. Montgomery, a Seattle-based MacArthur Fellow and professor of Geomorphology at the University of Washington and the author of award-winning popular-science books that have been translated into nine languages, is an internationally recognized geologist who studies landscape evolution and the effects of geological processes on ecological systems and human societies.

Learn more by reading an excerpt of one of David Montgomery’s books, The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health, co-authored with Anne Biklé.