Meet the Changemakers

From underwater archaeology and Black heritage, to being the first Irish Aquanaut, to conserving swaths of land in China, meet these three inspiring explorers who are using their field to better understand the world around us.

Don't miss The Explorers Club 50 Speaker Series with these "Changemakers" on Wednesday, June 30th at 7pm. They will talk about the what it means to be an explorer and a changemaker and how their work is impacting the future of their respective fields.

June 30, 2021

By: The Explorers Club and Discovery

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Photo By: Dr. Alicia Odewale

Photo By: Justin Dunnavant

Photo By: Matthew Lawrence

Photo By: Karl Shreeves & Reed Wiseman

Photo By: Wang Jingnan

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Photo By: Jiang Bingkun

Photo By: Wang Jingnan

Ayana Flewellen

Meet Ayana Omilade Flewellen. She is a Black Feminist, an archaeologist, a storyteller, and artist. She currently serves as the President-Elect of the Society of Black Archaeologists (SBA) and sits on the Board of Diving With A Purpose (DWP). She is also an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Riverside. Pictured here, Dr. Flewellen and her colleague are screening for artifacts at the Estate Little Princess in St. Croix.

Ayana Flewellen

Since the summer of 2016, Dr. Flewellen has worked with Diving with a Purpose (DWP), a community-focused, non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation and protection of submerged heritage resources. The Society of Black Archaeologists (SBA) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advocating for Black communities in the unearthing and telling of their histories. DWP is dedicated to conserving our oceans, focusing on coral reef education and restoration, and preserving submerged resources about the African diaspora. The intersection of her involvement and leadership in both organizations has led to the development of several projects that will have a lasting impact on African descent communities impacted by archaeological work.

Ayana Flewellen

Dr. Flewellen works to create pathways for African descendant people to unearth their history on land and underwater. She affirms that the land we walk on and the ocean that surrounds us hold so many stories about our past; within those stories are the lessons for how to live a better today and how to envision a brighter future for tomorrow.

Marc Ó Gríofa

Meet Dr. Ó Gríofa - a physician and biomedical engineer. He developed the first Irish ISS experiment, he was Ireland’s first Aquanaut, and spent 10+ years as part of the NASA NEEMO team. He currently oversees healthcare for the Las Vegas homeless population while serving as a tactical physician for LVMPD SWAT.

Marc Ó Gríofa

NEEMO, which stands for NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations, is a mission that sends groups of astronauts, engineers and scientists to live in Aquarius underwater laboratory, the world's only undersea research station, in preparation for future space exploration. In 2016, Dr. Ó Gríofa was selected as the first Irish Aquanaut on NASA NEEMO 21. He become the first person to ever sequence DNA underwater by obtaining samples from inside the Aquarius Undersea Habitat.

Marc Ó Gríofa

Among Dr. Ó Gríofa's many accomplishments, he was notably part of a two person dive team which set a world record for successfully planting the world’s deepest coral nursery. He also worked on designing a template to establish a model for genetically engineered environmentally resistant coral that could be replanted on the seafloor to help replenish coral reefs worldwide.

Marc Ó Gríofa

As a passionate shark diver, one of his personal highlights and privileges from this mission was sitting at the galley viewport for hours at night, in awe, watching from inches away as a family of bull sharks became ever more aggressive in their hunting patterns and feeding off the plethora of marine life outside in the national marine sanctuary.

Marco Ó Gríofa

From the depths of the ocean to space, Dr. Ó Gríofa was a PI for Project CASPER which was the first Irish experiment that flew onboard the ISS. He also spent four years at Kennedy Space Center as a physician and engineer working on the Space Shuttle.

Binbin Li

Meet Binbin Li, conservationist and assistant professor at Duku Kunshan University. She uses science to improve protected area effectiveness and endangered species conservation (for example, giant pandas), which brings her deep into the wilderness such as Mountains of Southwest China. Binbin closely works with local communities to find sustainable livelihoods for all.

Binbin Li

Binbin asserts that biodiversity is the foundation for ecological balance and sustainable development of human society. However, biodiversity conservation is often treated as the opponent for development and can lead to conflicts. Her work tries to identify the key areas for creating protected areas and improve their effectiveness to better protect threatened and endemic species, while reducing conflicts with local communities.

Binbin Li

Binbin's work aims to find the balance between biodiversity conservation and local development, engaging local communities in conservation and seeking sustainable livelihoods. For example, she works with local Tibetans to find a better way of raising livestock, instead of free ranging them within forest, which helps to avoid the degradation and loss of panda habitats. Her tactics also strive to improve economic returns.

Binbin Li

Binbin has inspired many young women to set foot in this area. By providing research opportunities for fieldwork, she has been engaging young people - especially women - to understand, to feel confident and to love conservation work, and to help them to succeed in this area.

Binbin Li

Paraphrasing from Dr. E.O. Wilson, Binbin firmly believes that the education of women is the best way to save our environment. To find the connection between nature and our hearts is the best way to connect the fate of biodiversity and our next generation.