Jorge Brenner, Ph.D., is the Executive Director for the Gulf of Mexico Coastal Ocean Observing System (GCOOS). He has more than fifteen years of experience in marine ecology, biodiversity conservation, geospatial data science, and climate change risk management. During the past ten years, he has served as an Associate Director of Marine Science and Sustainable Fisheries with The Nature Conservancy. He obtained his Ph.D. in Marine Science from the Catalonia Polytechnic University in Barcelona, Spain.