Paula Branshaw Carlson is Director of Husbandry at The Dallas World Aquarium, in Dallas, Texas. After graduating from Texas A&M University with a BS in Marine Biology, Paula began her career as a professional aquarist with Sea World of Florida in 1986. From there, she spent four years managing retail aquarium stores in Florida and Texas, before taking a position in 1995 at The Dallas World Aquarium.

An outspoken advocate for the important role that zoos and aquariums play in informal science education and conservation, her passion led her to pursue a MA degree in Zoo and Aquarium Leadership from George Mason University. Paula is an active member of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) and serves as Chair of the Marine Fishes Taxon Advisory Group (MFTAG) and is a member of the Animal Population Management Committee (APMC).

Paula’s love for fish began at the tender age of 6 when her father got her hooked on keeping fancy tailed guppies. Her professional aquarium passions are what a former employer termed “career fish” - the rare and unusual reef fishes, syngnathids (especially seadragons), and elasmobranchs.

She frequently shares her work on the husbandry of leafy seadragons, ribbon pipefish, and sawfish conservation with industry professionals at national and international conferences. Still an avid hobbyist, Paula is a long-time member of the Dallas/Ft.Worth Marine Aquarium Society.

In addition to her duties at The Dallas World Aquarium, Paula is a member of, two IUCN’s Specialist Groups - the Shark Specialist Group where she is Co-Chair of the Aquarium Working Group, and the Seahorse, Pipefish and Seadragon Specialist Group, where she serves as the ex situ Focal Point representative. In 2012, she participated in a workshop to help develop the IUCN’s Global Conservation Strategy for Sawfish, which was published in June 2014 and along with other public aquarium colleagues helped to establish the first International Sawfish Day in October 2017.

Paula is honored to serve on the Board of Directors of MISS (Minorities in Shark Sciences) as the Director of Partnerships.

Paula sees her career as more of a calling and feels incredibly fortunate to be able to help create awareness for marine conservation by fostering collaborations between professional aquarists and other related industries.

Alex Rose is the Science Editor for Ocean Geographic Magazine, and the Communications and Digital Media Editor for AMAZONAS Magazine. Alex is also a professional photographer, violinist, Explorers Club Fellow, PADI Divemaster, and lover of all things aquatic. She founded ocean conservation company, Blue Ring, at the beginning of 2017 in an effort to create a new method of ocean conservation accessible to and inclusive of everyone. Her driving goal is to find ways to protect our world’s precious marine habitats through diving, writing, photography, education, and research.

SPS fanatic for over 17 years. Old-fashioned coral butcher and wholesaler for several local Seattle Washington area locations. Retired treasurer and president of the Puget Sound Aquarium Society.

Currently running a SPS-dominated reef with a total water volume of 450 gallons.

As Donor Engagement Manager at Coral Restoration Foundation™, Michelle loves helping people make a difference for the environment.
From the Seagrasses of Tampa Bay to the Sharks of Bimini, Michelle has been an ambassador for marine conservation for her decade-long career. Coming to Coral Restoration Foundation™ from the International Game Fish Association, Michelle takes a passionate and pragmatic approach to nonprofit development. Starting her career as a marine science educator, Michelle has spoken to audiences across the United States, Dutch Caribbean, and the Bahamas through the Sea Life Aquarium in Minnesota, The Florida Aquarium, and for Sharks4Kids. Interning at the Bimini Biological Field Station and fundraising at Tampa Bay Watch, Michelle developed hands-on field experience and a passion for connecting environmental education to the community.
 
Michelle graduated with a B.S. in Biology from the University of South Florida. In her free time, she loves diving (especially with sharks) and sharing her passion for marine life with others.

Walt Smith has been an entrepreneur for decades, helping grow the industry we enjoy.

He is highly motivated to see www.adeproject.org succeed as the largest coral reef restoration project.

Passionate hobbyist turned Internationally known Industry Leader, Marc shares his wealth of knowledge regularly via social media channels as well as melevsreef.com. He's a public speaker, current president of DFWMAS, reef keeper and dog owner.

Lover of all things alive, including aquatic creatures, who can’t keep himself from bringing his laboratory practice into the hobby. Since rediscovering reefkeeping during the pandemic, Scott has made his own trace elements, adapted aquaria liquid handling systems, and utilised laboratory techniques for home testing.

He is in the home stretch of environmental microbiology and fermentation PhD focusing on novel species of lactic acid bacteria and taxonomy.

Scott’s scientific training allows him to view pushes within the industry from a different perspective, questioning and even challenging them. He is a casual hobbyist interested in coral parasites and disease, testing novel treatment methods for current coral ailments.

Travis Knorr, a former aquarium fish collector in the Florida Keys, worked as the Aquaculture Laboratory Technician at the College of the Florida Keys where he also co-founded the CFK Aquaculture Club.

In 2020, he became the Curator and Operations Manager of the Key West Aquarium, and then began work at MOTE’s Elizabeth Moore International Center for Coral Reef Restoration and Research as the Life Support Systems Manager. He is now pursuing a Masters in Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences at the University Florida, Tropical Aquaculture Lab.

In his free time, he runs a home marine aquaculture company, Summerland Ocean Life, with his amazing wife, Mick Walsh. The duo also maintain mixed reef, FOWLR, and freshwater aquaria including an aquaponic system. Travis has been a board member of the Marine Aquarium Societies of North America, and recently has taken on the position of President of the organization. His aim is to continue to grow MASNA, and expand the relationship between hobbyists, industry and academia.

Fadi is reefer and reef aquarium shop owner from Jordan. Fadi has a YouTube channel that speaks about his reefing journey, in Jordan Saudi Arabia and UAE.

Fadi loves Angelfish and Acropora, and always wanted to make a reef tank to hold them all. He built a 180-gallon tank filled with many angelfish and sps corals species in 2016. That tank was chosen by Reef2Reef to be Reef of the Month for April 2018.

James is a professor, writer, and photographer and is the author of the books Giant Clams in the Reef Aquarium and The Giant Clams. He has written several other books on marinelife and reef aquariums and has had nearly 500 articles published in various aquarium and scuba magazines in the U.S. and Europe over the last 25 years. He will be talking about the biology of giant clams and their husbandry in the aquarium.

Tia is a lifelong scientist, with her current projects including 76 fully aquacultured species of macroalgae, trace element dosing live rock, captive breeding seahorses and invertebrates, culturing phytoplankton using AI, feeder insects for reptiles and fish, macroalgae as a food source for humans and more.

All three of her degrees are focused in the hobby and nutrition, fueling her deep love of proper food with husbandry. For the "farm" currently under construction there are over 3300 gallons and over a hundred tanks being fueled by the Early Carboniferous and Ordovician-made "Lost sea" underground in Tennessee.

Having been on several sides of the hobby - from stopping cyanide collection on the ground in Indonesia, working as a collector in the Gulf of Mexico, working in a clownfish hatchery, being a veterinary technician for exotics and aquatics, renovating aquarium exhibits, and an academic researcher for climate change with corals - she loves to show multifaceted and intersectional views of the industry and exotic pet trade as a whole.

Todd Gardner is the general manager of Biota’s North Carolina production facility and a professor of Aquaculture and Marine Biology at Carteret Community College. He has been keeping aquariums for more than 40 years and he has devoted his entire life to understanding and culturing marine life. He also loves terrestrial life, music, and his family. Freshwater is okay too.

Kevin is the Industry Development Lead of the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP) and is based at the Australian Institute of Marine Science in Townsville. Additionally, Kevin is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in Marine Aquatic Animal Health at James Cook University (JCU), Aquatics Working Group Member of the Pet Industry Association of Australia (PIAA), and an Aquarium Advisory Panel member for the Forever Reef Project from Great Barrier Reef Legacy.

From 2021 – 2023 Kevin was a Board Member for the Aquarium Industry Association of Australia (AIAA), and from 2010 – 2022 he served on the Board of Directors of the Marine Aquarium Societies of North America (MASNA), where for the final seven years served as President, CEO, and Chief Marine Scientist.

Kevin holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Marine Biology from the Florida Institute of Technology, a Certificate in Aquarium Science from the Oregon Coast Community College, a Master’s Degree in Aquatic Pathobiology from the Institute of Aquaculture at the University of Stirling, and a PhD in Marine Ornamental Biosecurity from Central Queensland University.

Kevin resides in Northern Queensland, Australia where he spends his free time diving and exploring the rainforests.

I've worked on coral reefs in the Caribbean, Hawaii, and a variety of places in the Pacific including two years in the Philippines and six years in Australia. I've been living and working in American Samoa now for 20 years.

He got his B.A. Reed College, 1971, and his Ph.D. at the University of Pennsylvania 1976.

For the last ten years he has worked as a part time contractor for NOAA.Ten years before that worked for Dept Marine and Wildlife Resources, American Samoa govt. Six years before that for JEN Veron at the Australian Institute of Marine Science, and two years before that worked in the Philippines.

Publications: Corals of Hawaii
Over 45 peer-reviewed articles
10 PDF field guides to corals at different locations in the Pacific.

With 15 years experience working on the Great Barrier Reef, Paul is a biologist, dive instructor and ship’s captain, with a strong grounding in tourism, operations and logistics.

Gene Diveglia is co-owner of Reef Labs, Inc., a Tampa, FL based water analysis laboratory that performs analytical testing, including ICP water analysis for saltwater tanks and commercial aquaculture systems.
Gene is passionate about everything related to science and technology, and you can see his signature in every aspect of Reef Labs, Inc. “The ICP lab” aims to provide its customers with exceptional results and proven successful practices.

Since 1994, Steve has been an aquarium hobbyist and has filled his fish room with everything from aquatic turtles to reef aquariums. To help pay for college tuition and support his aquarium addiction, he worked at two large family-owned fish stores in Michigan. Steve earned a degree in Zoology with a concentration in Marine Biology from Lyman Briggs College at Michigan State University. After graduating, Steve entered the public aquarium field. As a Senior Aquarist at the Florida Aquarium, he managed a variety of exhibits from a few gallons to 500,000 gallons. Currently, Steve is an Associate Curator at the Georgia Aquarium, where he oversees the Tropical Diver and Coldwater Quest galleries. He is also heavily involved in the coral conservation field work that the Georgia Aquarium performs.

Dennis is the aquarist behind the online persona of Tigahboy who has been championing macroalgae display tanks as an alternative to keeping traditional coral-dominated reef tanks for the past several years. He has been at the forefront of the recent popularization of macroalgae/marine planted tanks as a separate and distinct sub-category/niche of the aquarium hobby. Dennis has been sharing footage of his macroalgae tanks online and on social media, primarily through his Instagram account @tigahboy.h2o, and his projects all showcase macroalgae as the star of the tank with a heavy emphasis on aquascaping and overall composition. He was a speaker at the last MACNA in Milwaukee presenting on this very topic and his macroalgae projects have been showcased in various publications, YouTube channels, and podcasts.

Morgan Moore is a Florida native who fell in love with reefkeeping 20 years ago and has an enduring passion for the hobby. Raised by a hard working, single Mom who always had a love for gardening and nature, Morgan grew up with that same appreciation for the planet. Over the years Morgan has grown and shipped thousands of coral frags all over the U.S. Dedicating time to educating other hobbyists about coral husbandry and care is something that has always been a priority in her business. Morgan has given presentations to reef clubs throughout the country and at MACNA, as well written articles for ReefBuilders.com, Reefs.com, and CORAL magazine.

Lyre Squire Jrn is president of the peak representative body for the Marine aquarium Fish and Coral fisheries in Qld for nearly 20 years, being at the forefront of driving sustainable collections for public aquaria for at least a decade.

Travis will be touring a really cool facility, more info to come