Gary M. King has received the Distinguished Service Award from the Natural Council of Maine, the President's Creative Achievement Award from the University of Maine, and the Graduate Research and Teaching Award from the College of Science at the University of Maine. He was a Fulbright research fellow in Denmark from 1988-1990 and was the Chief Scientist/Aquanaut Team Leader for the "Aquarius" missions 88-2 and 89-2 and Hydolab 84-5. He received his Ph.D with honors from the University of Georgia, is a professor of Microbiology and Oceanography at the University of Maine, and has published more than 80 papers in refereed scientific journals. In 1986, Tom Fenchel was the recipient of the Ecology Institute Prize and the Huntsman Medal for Excellency in Oceanography. He is an honorary member of the Society for General Microbiology and is a Professor of Marine Biology and the Director of the Marine Biological Laboratory at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. He has authored and co-authored several books and has published about 120 original and review papers on microbial ecology, marine biology and population biology.

He holds a Ph.D and a Dr.Sc. from the University of Copenhagen and is a member of the Danish Royal Academy of Sciences and of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.