The very renowned scientist in oceanography, Professor Trevor Platt, FRS, was born in August, 12 1942, in Salford, England. He finished his undergraduate studies at the University of Nottingham in UK (1963) and moved to Canada to study for MA at University of Toronto (1965) and Ph.D. at Dalhousie University (1970). He was the Head of Biological Oceanography during 1972-2001, and senior scientist during 2001-2008 at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography, Nova Scotia, Canada. In 2008, he moved back to UK and joined the Plymouth Marine Laboratory as Professorial Fellow as well as the executive director of the Partnership for Observation of the Global Ocean (POGO).

He provided remarkable contributions in fundamental and applied research in the broad fields of oceanography, phytoplankton ecology, marine ecosystem dynamics, marine optics, ocean colour remote sensing, ocean carbon cycle and climate change with more then 320 scientific publications during his scientific career.

Professor Platt received numerous honors, medals and awards in recognition of his contributions to oceanography, including ‘APICS-Fraser Gold medal (1982)’, ‘Rosenstiel Gold medal (1984)’, ‘G. Evenly Hutchinson medal (1988)’, ‘Fellowship of the Royal Society of Canada, Academy of Science (1990)’, ‘A. G. Huntsman medal (1992)’, ‘Fellowship of the Royal Society of London (1998)’, ‘Plymouth Marine medal (1999)’, ‘Timothy Parsons medal (2006)’, ‘Prix de Distinction (2007), Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Canada’, ‘ Prix d’Excellence, Department of Fisheries and Oceans (2008)’, and ‘Jawaharlal Nehru Science Fellow of the Government of India (2014)’.

Professor Platt also showed his strong leadership in numerous international scientific organizations, and contributed to: NATO Advance Study Institute, Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR), International Joint Global Ocean Flux Study (JGOFS), American Society of Limnology and Oceanography, International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), International Geosphere-Biosphere Program (IGBP), International Ocean Colour Coordinating Group (IOCCG), and the Partnership for Observation of the Global Oceans (POGO).

In particular, as a founder and the first chairman of IOCCG, he played significant roles to raise recognition of importance in ocean colour remote sensing. He had special interests in educating and encouraging young scientists and scientists from developing countries. He organized international training courses to promote capacity building for young scientists through IOCCG and POGO since 1997.

Professor Platt, passed away on April 5, 2020. He is survived by his loving wife and colleague of over 30 years, Dr. Shubha Sathyendranath.

The text above was kindly provided by Dr Seunghyun Son and originally published in the book Satellite Derived Global Ocean Product Validation/Evaluation. Seunghyun Son, Trevor Platt and Shubha Sathyendranath (Eds.). Pages: 280. December 2020. https://doi.org/10.3390/books978-3-03943-646-0