2016 University Lecture
Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Woods
Presented by Richard Primack, Professor of Biology
Wednesday, October 26, 2016 at 7 p.m.
Tsai Performance Center
685 Commonwealth Avenue
Boston, Massachusetts
Admission is free. The public is cordially invited.
Dr. Richard Primack has been a Professor of Biology at Boston University since 1978. He received a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard University, Doctor of Philosophy from Duke University, and was a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Canterbury and Harvard University. Dr. Primack’s research has focused on plant ecology, conservation biology, and tropical rainforests, in Malaysia, New Zealand, Japan, and Central America. He currently investigates the effects of climate change on the plants, birds, and insects of Massachusetts.
Dr. Primack has written over 180 scientific papers and books, over 100 popular articles and editorials, and the recent book, Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Woods. He has authored two widely used textbooks in conservation biology, and developed an innovative model to work with local coauthors to create foreign language editions with local examples; 34 foreign editions have been published with another 8 in production.
Dr. Primack also contributes to Boston University as a faculty member of the Biogeoscience Program, Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future, and the Kilachand Honors College. He has served the broader scientific community as President of the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation and is currently Editor-in-Chief of the international journal Biological Conservation.
Dr. Primack has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Distinguished Service Award from the Society for Conservation Biology, and visiting professorships in Japan, Hong Kong, and the Czech Republic. He is currently a Distinguished Overseas Professor at the Northeast Forestry University in China, and a Humboldt Research Awardee in Germany. His projects and those of his graduate students, particularly those on the effects of climate change on Thoreau’s Concord, have been featured in The New York Times, Boston Globe, American Scientist, The Wall Street Journal, New Scientist, and National Geographic, and on National Public Radio and HBO.