Mark J. Plotkin

Mark J. Plotkin, Ph.D., is an ethnobotanist and president of the Amazon Conservation Team, an environmental organization whose express goal is to conserve biodiversity, health, and culture in tropical America by working in partnership with the indigenous peoples there. He studied at Harvard and Yale and earned his Ph.D. from Tufts University. He received the San Diego Zoo Gold Medal for Conservation (1993) and in 2001 TIME magazine named him an Environmental
Hero for the Planet.” In 2004 he was awarded the Roy Chapman Andrews Distinguished Explorer Award and in 2005 Smithsonian magazine hailed him as one of “35 Who Made a Difference.” He is the author of several books including Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice and Medicine Quest: In Search of Nature’s Healing Secrets.