As an undergraduate at Barnard College, New York, Sally Benson loved both physics and natural history. A geology course at nearby Columbia University showed her a way to combine those interests. Designed to lure those with strong quantitative backgrounds away from physics and chemistry, it put Benson on track for a geology degree. “I imagined working on the geophysical properties of the mantle–core boundary of the planet,” she says. (See CV)

A summer job at the Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) set Benson on a long-term path as a geothermal-energy researcher and environmental problem solver. Her PhD dissertation topic — remediation of toxic selenium from the soils and water of Kesterson reservoir, a marsh in California — was one of the first studies to use the natural biogeochemistry as a remediation strategy for inorganic contaminants. She demonstrated that microbes played a key role in converting selenium to an immobile, non-toxic form. “This project led me to believe science could play an immediate role in environmental problem solving,” she says.

Her ability to communicate science effectively swept her into administration, when she became director of the Earth sciences division at the LBNL. Certain that the team could provide solutions to major challenges, notably climate change, she kept an eye on emerging issues to develop the LBNL's portfolio of research in regional climate modelling, carbon-flux monitoring, carbon sequestration and geological storage of carbon dioxide. After a few years, she also became the associate laboratory director for the energy sciences. In 2004, she left management to focus on her interest in testing geological storage of carbon dioxide as a method of mitigating climate change.

On 1 March, however, Benson's experiences and interests coalesced when she became executive director of Stanford University's Global Climate and Energy Project (GCEP). She says it was the breadth of the endeavour — covering all aspects of carbon dioxide and climate-related problems — that motivated her move.

“No one can guess how market forces and research will play out over the next 30–50 years,” says GCEP project director Franklin Orr. However, the LBNL's acting director of earth sciences, Ernie Major, says Benson's expertise lies in integrating all the research demands needed to find answers. And finding them is Benson's new passion. “It's a critical time to put solutions on the table,” she says.