Markus Kleber is a professor in the Crop and Soil Science Department at Oregon State University. Recently, his scientific attention has turned to two major challenges to the functioning of the biosphere: the globally observed acceleration of soil degradation and the equally alarming indications for a decline in biodiversity. Kleber spent the first 10 years of his professional life in the German Navy. After participating in multiple cruises to the Atlantic and Indian Ocean and accumulating over 1,100 flight hours, he earned an MSc in agricultural biology from the University of Hohenheim, Germany. He obtained a doctorate in soil science from the same institution, and continued his career as wissenschaftlicher assistent at the Martin Luther Universitaet Halle Wittenberg (Germany), where he was in charge of the soil mineralogy laboratory. In 2005, he relocated to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California, as a geological scientist. He then moved on to a faculty position in the Department of Crop and Soil Science at Oregon State University.