Natalie Schmitt

Natalie is an empathetic ecologist, conservation geneticist, and documentary director/presenter, deeply passionate about protecting biodiversity using western and Indigenous science, public education, and community empowerment. She was recently selected as one of the Explorers Club 50 people changing the world that the world needs to know about and is an ambassador for the Earth Foundation. Studying elusive, endangered species, like snow leopard and Antarctic whales, she has empowered grass-roots conservation, and enabled policy education and management improvement at various scales, including that of the International Whaling Commission. Natalie is developing a portable leading-edge technology to detect DNA from biological samples in real time, at low cost and easy-to-use and leads a skilled, synergistic team of geneticists, conservationists, communicators, business partners, and institutions. Her company, WildTechDNA aims to categorically revolutionize the way customs, law-enforcement, field monitoring practices, citizen science, and locally based conservation are conducted around the world.