Mike Velings understands the potential for business to create durable solutions to complex world problems.

Peter Tyack of Woods Hole talks about a hidden wonder of the sea: underwater sound. Onstage at Mission Blue, he explains the amazing ways whales use sound and song to communicate across hundreds of miles of ocean.

Aboard Mission Blue, scientist Greg Stone tells the story of how he helped the Republic of Kiribati to create an enormous protected area in the middle of the Pacific -- protecting fish, sealife and perhaps the island nation itself.

Tuna are ocean athletes -- fast, far-ranging predators whose habits we're just beginning to understand. Marine biologist Barbara Block fits tuna with tracking tags (complete with transponders) that record unprecedented amounts of data about these gorgeous, threatened fish and the ocean habitats they move through.

Barbara Block studies how tuna, billfish and sharks move around (and stay warm) in the open ocean. Knowing how these large predators travel through pelagic waters will help us understand their role in the wider ocean ecosystem.

Oceanographer John Delaney is leading the team that is building an underwater network of high-def cameras and sensors that will turn our ocean into a global interactive lab -- sparking an explosion of rich data about the world below.

Rob Dunbar hunts for data on our climate from 12,000 years ago, finding clues inside ancient seabeds and corals and inside ice sheets. His work is vital in setting baselines for fixing our current climate -- and in tracking the rise of deadly ocean acidification.

John Delaney leads the team that is building a cabled network of deep-ocean sensors that will study, over time and space, the way the ocean's complex processes interact. By networking the ocean to gather data, he's helping to revolutionize ocean science.

Dianna Cohen co-founded the Plastic Pollution Coalition, which is working to help end our cycle of plastics use.

Kristina Gjerde is an expert on the law of the high seas -- the vast areas of the sea and seabed that exist beyond any national jurisdiction. These places belong to the world; Gjerde's work helps the world work together to protect them.

The ocean has degraded within our lifetimes, as shown in the decreasing average size of fish. And yet, as Daniel Pauly shows us onstage at Mission Blue, each time the baseline drops, we call it the new "normal." At what point do we stop readjusting downward?

What's link between the ocean's health and our health? Marine biologist Stephen Palumbi shows how toxins at the bottom of the ocean food chain find their way into our bodies -- and tells a shocking story of toxic contamination in the fish market, where consumers were being tricked into buying fish that's not only mislabeled but unsafe.

Stephen Palumbi studies the way humanity and ocean life interact and intertwine. His insights into our codependence offer ideas for protecting both the ocean and ourselves.

Peter Tyack studies the social behavior and acoustic communication in whales and dolphins, learning how these animals use sound to perform critical activities, such as mating and locating food.

Photographer Brian Skerry shoots life above and below the waves -- as he puts it, both the horror and the magic of the ocean. Sharing amazing, intimate shots of undersea creatures, he shows how powerful images can help make change.

Artist Dianna Cohen shares some tough truths about plastic pollution in the ocean and in our lives -- and some thoughts on how to free ourselves from the plastic gyre.

A leader in the study of the ecology and evolution of marine organisms, Jeremy Jackson is known for his deep understanding of geological time.

Underwater filmmaker Mike deGruy has spent decades looking intimately at the ocean. A consummate storyteller, he takes the stage at Mission Blue to share his awe and excitement -- and his fears -- about the blue heart of our planet.

Some 80 to 90 percent of undersea creatures make light -- and we know very little about how or why. Bioluminescence expert Edith Widder explores this glowing, sparkling, luminous world, sharing glorious images and insight into the unseen depths (and brights) of the ocean.

Enric Sala shares glorious images -- and surprising insights and data -- from some of the most pristine areas of the ocean. He shows how we can restore more of our oceans to this healthy, balanced state, and the powerful ecological and economic benefits of doing so.

Dr. Enric Sala is a former university professor who saw himself writing the obituary of ocean life and quit academia to become a full-time conservationist as a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence.

Dee Boersma considers penguins ocean sentinels, helping us understand the effects of pollution, overfishing and climate change on the marine environment.

Greg Stone was a key driver in the establishment of the Phoenix Island Protected Area in the island nation of Kiribati. The second-largest marine protected area in the world -- and one of the most pristine -- PIPA is a laboratory for exploring and monitoring the recovery of coral reefs from bleaching events.

Kristina Gjerde studies the law of the high seas -- the 64 percent of our ocean that isn't protected by any national law at all. Gorgeous photos show the hidden worlds that Gjerde and other lawyers are working to protect from trawling and trash-dumping, through smart policymaking and a healthy dose of PR.

Think of penguins as ocean sentinels, says Dee Boersma -- they're on the frontlines of sea change. Sharing stories of penguin life and culture, she suggests that we start listening to what penguins are telling us.

Mike deGruy filmed in and on the ocean for more than three decades -- becoming almost as famous for his storytelling as for his glorious, intimate visions of the sea and the creatures who live in it.

Rob Dunbar looks deeply at ancient corals and sediments to study how the climate and the oceans have shifted over the past 50 to 12,000 years -- and how the Antarctic ecosystem is changing right now.

We're headed towards a global food crisis: Nearly 3 billion people depend on the ocean for food, and at our current rate we already take more fish from the ocean than it can naturally replace. In this fact-packed, eye-opening talk, entrepreneur and conservationist Mike Velings proposes a solution: Aquaculture, or fish farming. "We must start usi...

In this bracing talk, coral reef ecologist Jeremy Jackson lays out the shocking state of the ocean today: overfished, overheated, polluted, with indicators that things will get much worse. Astonishing photos and stats make the case.

The way we fish for popular seafood such as salmon, tuna and shrimp is threatening to ruin our oceans. Paul Greenberg explores the sheer size and irrationality of the seafood economy, and suggests a few specific ways we can change it, to benefit both the natural world and the people who depend on fishing for their livelihoods.