EAT, PREY, LOVE: The Role of Food & Mates in Shaping Lion Societies
Institute Seminar by Stotra Chakrabarti
- Date: Jun 4, 2024
- Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
- Speaker: Stotra Chakrabarti
- Dr. Stotra Chakrabarti is an Assistant Professor of Animal Behaviour at Macalester College, Minnesota, USA. He has a MS in Wildlife Sciences and a PhD in Animal Behaviour from the Wildlife Institute of India, and he did his Postdoctoral Research from the University of Minnesota. He is a behavioural ecologist & conservation biologist, who’s expertise is in studying the links between fundamental animal ecology and applied conservation, with large mammals (especially carnivores) as study species. Stotra’s curiosity in the natural world began with a childhood spent watching leopards and elephants in the vicinity of where he grew up: the foothills of Himalayas in India. Subsequently, a very immersive and rigorous graduate program at the Wildlife Institute of India cemented his interest in animal behaviour and conservation biology.
- Location: Bückle St. 5a, 78467 Konstanz
- Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Bücklestrasse + Online
- Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
- Contact: nborrego@ab.mpg.de
Lions are iconic top predators that feature intensely in research and conservation projects. However, majority of such research has focused on lions in prey-rich savanna habitats. The typical model lion thus belongs to only a few charismatic populations, thereby confining our understanding of the behaviour of a widely distributed species. In this seminar, by summarizing my long-term behavioural research on Asiatic lions (a non-model population) and comparisons with East African savanna systems, I will delve into the ecological and evolutionary causes and consequences of sociality in lions. I will also briefly outline potential new collaboration/s with the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behaviour at the University of Konstanz. I will end with an ECR perspective of working with a species that continues to awe us while also severely challenging our lives and livelihoods.
The MPI-AB Seminar Series is open to members of MPI and Uni Konstanz. The zoom link is published each week in the MPI-AB newsletter.