Geert Potters is part of the corrosion team at the Antwerp Maritime Academy, and is also the Research Coordinator for the entire institution. Originally not trained as a maritime scientist but as a plant physiologist, he defended a PhD on antioxidants and plant growth, and went on to research the use of bamboo in a sustainable green economy. However, as a proud resident of Europe’s (second) largest port, he found his way into the maritime sector, helped set up the corrosion team in 2007, co-authored a fair number of publications on the subject, and mentored two PhD theses in Nautical Sciences at the Academy. He is currently looking for connections between biology (micro-organisms) and the shipping world, and tries to get future captains involved and enthusiastic about sustainable development and a greener world. He writes for a popular science blog, podcast, sings (but not in the lab), and likes to confuse honest sailors with words like “multivariate statistics”, “environmental metagenomics” and “impact factor”.