| | 1 | Name: | Dr. Kamaljit S. Bawa | | | Institution: | University of Massachusetts; Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment | | | Year Elected: | 2019 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1939 | | | | | | |
Kamal Bawa (www.kbawa.com) is Distinguished Professor of Biology at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and Founder-President of the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE). The Ashoka Trust, based in Bangalore, is one of India’s top-ranked environmental think tanks and in 2019 received the UNESCO Sultan Qaboos Prize for Environmental Conservation. He has done extensive work in the Himalaya for a number of years on a wide range of issues from biodiversity conservation to climate change. Kamal Bawa has published more than 200 papers and has authored or edited more than 10 books, and special issues of journals. Among the many awards he has received are: Bullard Fellowship at Harvard University (1972, 2009) Guggenheim Fellowship (1987), Pew Scholar in Conservation and the Environment (1992), Giorgio Ruffolo Fellowship at Harvard University (2009), the Gunnerus Prize in Sustainability Science from the Royal Norwegian Society of Letters and Sciences (2012), the international MIDORI Prize in Biodiversity (2014) from the Aeon Foundation in Japan, the Linnean Medal (2018), and honorary doctorates from the University of Alberta (2014) and Concordia University in Montreal(2019). He is an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2012), the Royal Norwegian Society of Letters and Sciences (2012), and the Royal Society (2015). Kamal Bawa is founding Editor-in Chief of two interdisciplinary journals: Conservation and Society (www.conservationandsociety.org) and Ecology, Economy and Society (http://ecoinsee.org/journal/eb_editors). His latest coffee table book Himalaya: The Mountains of Life, a companion volume to Sahyadri: India’s Western Ghats, was published in 2013. | |
| 2 | Name: | Dr. Sandra Díaz | | | Institution: | Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina; Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Vegetal, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Argentina | | | Year Elected: | 2022 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1961 | | | | | | |
Sandra Díaz is Professor of Ecology at Córdoba National University, senior member of the Argentine National Research Council and Visiting Professor at the School of Geography and the Environment, Oxford University. She is interested in plant functional traits and syndromes, their effects on ecosystem properties and their interactions with global change drivers. She constructed the first global quantitative picture of essential functional diversity of vascular plants –the global spectrum of plant form and function. She has advanced theory and practical implementation of the concept of functional diversity and its effects on ecosystem properties and benefits. She combines her ecology studies with interdisciplinary work on how different societies value and reconfigure nature. She founded Núcleo DiverSus on Diversity and Sustainability, and co-founded the Global Communal Plant Trait Initiative TRY. She co-chaired the Global Assessment of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. She is a member of the Academies of Sciences of Argentina, USA, France, Norway, Latin America and the Developing World, and Foreign Fellow of the British Royal Society. Her awards include the Margalef Prize in Ecology (2017), the Gunnerus Award in Sustainability Science (2019), the Kew International Medal (2020) and the BBVA Frontiers of Knowledge in Ecology and Conservation Award (2021). | |
| 3 | Name: | Professor Sir Charles Godfray | | | Institution: | Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford | | | Year Elected: | 2021 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1958 | | | | | | |
Charles Godfray was an undergraduate at the University of Oxford and received his PhD from Imperial College London in 1983. He held a temporary lectureship at Oxford before joining the faculty at Imperial College in 1987 where he remained until 2006, latterly as Director of the NERC Centre for Population Biology. He then returned to Oxford as Hope Professor in the Department of Zoology, in 2018 taking up a new role in the University as Director of the interdisciplinary Oxford Martin School and Professor of Population Biology. He is a fellow of Balliol College. Charles’ research has been in ecology, evolution and epidemiology, and has involved both theoretical approaches as well as field and laboratory studies, typically using insect systems. Starting from his PhD work he has been interested in the structure of communities and pioneered ways of testing theories in community ecology by the construction of quantitative food webs and then doing manipulation experiments in the field. Most recently his community ecology work has included the effects of symbionts (the insect microbiome). He has worked extensively on insect population dynamics and its application to pest management, especially in the tropics. In evolution he has used a group of insects called parasitic wasps to test broad questions in areas such as sex ratio and life history theory. He has employed game theory to develop evolutionary theories of parent-offspring conflict and of signalling within the family. He is very interested in the science policy interface and has worked extensively on food systems, both academically and in advisory roles for UK Government and other organisations. Charles has received the Scientific Medal and the Frink Medal from the Zoological Society of London, and the Linnaean Medal from the Linnaean Society. He is an Honorary Member or Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, the British Ecological Society, and the International Academy of Food Science and Technology. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and a member of Academia Europaea and the American Academy of Arts and Science. He was knighted for contributions to science and science advice to government in 2017. | |
| 4 | Name: | Dr. Jane Goodall | | | Institution: | Jane Goodall Institute | | | Year Elected: | 1988 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1934 | | | | | | |
Jane Goodall began her landmark study of chimpanzees in Tanzania in June 1960, under the mentorship of anthropologist and paleontologist Dr. Louis Leakey. Her work at the Gombe Stream Chimpanzee Reserve would become the foundation of future primatological research and redefine the relationship between humans and animals. One of Jane's most significant discoveries came in her first year at Gombe, when she saw chimps stripping leaves off stems to make the stems useful for fishing termites out of nearby mounds. This and subsequent observations of Gombe chimps making and using tools would force science to rethink the definition that separated man from other animals: "man the toolmaker." Jane also observed chimps hunting and eating bushpigs and other animals, disproving the widely held belief that chimpanzees were primarily vegetarians. Dr. Goodall defied scientific convention by giving the chimpanzees names instead of numbers, and insisted on the validity of her observations that the chimps had distinct personalities, minds and emotions. She wrote of lasting chimpanzee family bonds. Through the years her work yielded surprising insights such as the discovery that chimpanzees engage in warfare. Dr. Goodall established the Gombe Stream Research Center in 1964. Under the stewardship of Tanzanian field staff and other researchers, it continues Dr. Goodall's work today, making it one of the longest uninterrupted wildlife studies in existence. In 1977, Goodall established the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI), which supports the Gombe work and other research, education and conservation and development programs. These include community-centered conservation efforts in Africa that empower villagers to build sustainable livelihoods while promoting regional conservation goals such as reforestation and an end to the illegal commercial bushmeat trade. JGI's Roots & Shoots program, which supports students from preschool through university in projects that benefit people, animals and the environment, today hosts about 6,000 worldwide groups in more than 87 countries. Dr. Goodall travels an average of 300 days per year, speaking about the threats facing chimpanzees, other environmental crisis, and her reason for hope that human kind will solve the problems it has imposed on the earth. She continually urges her audiences to recognize their personal responsibility and ability to effect change through consumer action, lifestyle change and activism. Her most recent book is Seeds of Hope: Wisdom and Wonder From the World of Plants (2013). In 2016 she was awarded the Krogman Award from the Penn Museum and in 2021 she won the Templeton Prize. | |
| 5 | Name: | Dr. Bert Hölldobler | | | Institution: | Biozentrum of the University of Würzburg; Arizona State University | | | Year Elected: | 1997 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1936 | | | | | | |
Bert Hölldobler is one of the foremost authorities in the world on insect behavior and the behavioral ecology of invertebrate animals. In a series of brilliant experiments and field studies over the past forty years, he has demonstrated the extreme adaptations to the environment of which the insect brain is capable: for example, the demonstration of military-like strategies and "diplomacy" in conflict between ant colonies and the basis of ant trap jaw predation -- the reflex arc and most rapid mechanical movements known in animals. His Pulitzer Prize-winning book (with E.O. Wilson) The Ants is a widely-hailed classic, and The Superorganism, Wilson's and Hölldobler's most recent collaboration, provides another in-depth look at the intricate ways of social insects. As Professor of Zoology Emeritus at the Biozentrum of the University of Würzburg and Foundation Professor of Life Sciences at the Arizona State University School of Life Sciences, Dr. Hölldobler continues his interest in the evolution of social organizations in insects and in the underlying mechanisms that make insect societies work. In 2016 he was awarded the Lorenz Oken Medal. | |
| 6 | Name: | Lord John Richard Krebs | | | Institution: | University of Oxford & Pembroke College & UK Food Standards Agency | | | Year Elected: | 2000 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1945 | | | | | | |
Sir John Krebs received a D.Phil at the University of Oxford in 1970. He has held faculty positions at the Institute of Animal Resource Ecology at the University of British Columbia and the University College of North Wales and was S.R.C. Research Officer of the Animal Behavior Research Group and University Lecturer at the Edward Grey Institute of Field Ornithology at the University of Oxford. Formerly a fellow of Wolfson College, he was an Official Fellow at Pembroke College from 1988 to 2005. Sir John has also served as director of the AFRC Unit of Ecology and Behavior (1989-94), director of the NERC Unit of Behavioural Ecology (1989-94), chief executive officer of the Natural Environment Research Council (1994-99) and chairman of the UK Food Standards Agency (2000-05). He is currently serving as the Royal Society Research Professor at the University of Oxford, a position he has held since 1988. Since October 2005, he has been the Principal of Jesus College, Oxford. For thirty years, Sir John Krebs has been a leading researcher in applying quantitative methods to the functions of animal behavior, especially birds. His elegant studies of territoriality and the use of living space, the behavioral mechanisms involved, including birdsong, and the application of economic concepts to the use of food resources were seminal in establishing the new discipline of behavioral ecology. He co-edited the leading advanced textbook for training behavioral ecologists throughout the world. Sir John Krebs has been honoured by the Zoological Society with the scientific Medal in 1981 and the Frink Medal in 1997, by the Linnaean Society with the Bicentenary Medal in 1983 and by the American Ornithologists' Union with the Elliott Coues Award in 1999. He was awarded the Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour Medal in 2000 and the Royal Society for the Promotion of Health's Benjamin Ward Richardson Gold Medal in 2002. He received a Knighthood for services to Behavioural Ecology in 1999. He is a member of the Royal Society, Max Planck Society, Academia Europaea, British Ecological Society and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. He has served as president of the International Society of Behavioural Ecology and the Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. He was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2000 and of the National Academy of Sciences in 2004, and was made Honorary Fellow of the German Ornithologists' Society in 2003. | |
| 7 | Name: | Lord Robert McCredie May | | | Institution: | Univerity of Oxford and The Royal Society | | | Year Elected: | 2001 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1936 | | | Death Date: | April 28, 2020 | | | | | | |
Sir Robert May is President of the Royal Society and holds a Professorship jointly in the Department of Zoology, Oxford University and at Imperial College, London. For the five-year period ending in September of 2000, he was Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Government and Head of its Office of Science and Technology. After earning a D.Phil. degree in Theoretical Physics from Sydney University, Sir Robert spent two years as the MacKay Lecturer in Applied Mathematics at Harvard. He then returned to Sydney University as Senior Lecturer in Theoretical Physics, where he would hold that institution's first Personal Chair. In 1973, Sir Robert joined the faculty of Princeton University as its Class of 1877 Professor of Zoology and, from 1977-88, he also served as Chair of the University Research Board. Returning to Britain as a Royal Society Research Professor, Sir Robert's current work deals with the factors influencing the diversity and abundance of plant and animal species, and with the rates, causes and consequences of extinction. His recent publications in this area include Large Scale Ecology and Conservation Biology (1994), Extinction Rates (1995) and Evolution of Biological Diversity (1999). Sir Robert's contributions to the field of ecological research have been recognized with the Crafoord Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the 1998 Balzan Prize, among numerous other honors. | |
| 8 | Name: | Dr. Robin A. Weiss | | | Institution: | University College London | | | Year Elected: | 2018 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | International | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1940 | | | | | | |
Robin Weiss is Emeritus Professor of Viral Oncology at University College London. He has spent most of his career conducting research on oncogenic viruses and on HIV. He is noted for his contributions to the discovery of endogenous retroviral genomes and for identifying CD4 as the HIV receptor. His expanded his research on avian endogenous retroviruses inherited through the host genome to consider mammalian retroviruses including the potential infection hazard by these agents in xenotransplantation of pig tissues to humans. He studied viral oncogenes and viruses involved in AIDS-linked malignancies such as Kaposi’s sarcoma. He showed that in dogs, a sexually transmitted tumor cell clone emerged around 10,000 years ago which has colonized dogs worldwide and continues to spread as a ‘parasite’. He applied pseudotype techniques originally devised for retroviruses to the study of receptors and antibody neutralization for other viruses such as influenza, rabies and ebola. He recently exploited single-chain llama nanobodies for HIV vaccines and diagnostics and he currently investigates the history of infectious diseases. Weiss was Director of Research at the Institute of Cancer Research, London, 1980-1999, and was President of the Society for General Microbiology, 2006-2009. He has chaired the Scientific Advisory Board of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative and served on the Board of Directors of the Africa Health Research Institute and on the Nuffield Council for Bioethics. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences. | |
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