Heike received her master’s degree and doctorate from the University of Tübingen and worked with the National Resource Center for Cephalopods in Galveston, Texas. Her postdoctoral work was completed at Hopkins Marine Station at Stanford University in association with the California Fish and Game Commission and at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Throughout her professional and personal life, Heike’s passion was focused on conservation and environmental research and raising community awareness of these critical issues. She was a leading scientist in CIOR and engaged local residents in the mission to bring back oysters to local waters. She mentored graduate students from Hunter College’s Animal Behavior and Conservation program, developed scientific protocols, and envisioned CIOR’s initial oyster reef deployment plan. As a senior research associate and faculty member in Hunter College’s Department of Psychology, her research focused on the social behavior of marine species and modifications due to environmental changes. Heike was instrumental in the protection of the endangered chambered nautilus under the auspices of the Endangered Species Act in 2016. Her enormous impact on the environment that she worked so hard to preserve and on the mission of CIOR will be everlasting.