Dr Christoph Meyer
School of Science, Engineering & Environment
University of Salford
Peel Building
M5 4WT Salford
Current positions
Reader
Biography
Following undergraduate studies in Biology at the University of Tübingen (Germany) and the University of Miami (USA) I obtained a MSc degree in Biology (Diploma) from the University of Würzburg (Germany) in 2003. As a result of an early-developed interest in tropical ecosystems and wildlife, which deepened throughout my undergraduate years, I then embarked on a PhD to study Neotropical bats and how they are affected by habitat fragmentation.
In 2007 I earned a PhD in animal ecology from the University of Ulm (Germany) under the late Prof. Elisabeth Kalko, which involved two years of field work in Panama based at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI). During a subsequent Conservation International-funded postdoc, also at the University of Ulm, I synthesized numerous data sets provided by colleagues aimed at assessing the suitability of tropical bats for inclusion in long-term monitoring programs.
In 2009 I joined the Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Changes (cE3c) at the University of Lisbon (Portugal) as Research Fellow, where I have worked on a variety of projects addressing ecological and conservation-related issues in the tropics (e.g. Brazil, São Tomé) and Iberia (Portugal, Spain). I joined the University of Salford as Lecturer in Global Ecology & Conservation in November 2015 and was promoted to Reader in 2022.
Areas of Research
I am an animal ecologist with general research interests at the nexus of biodiversity research, landscape ecology, and conservation biology. My line of research centres on timely topics in conservation biology and sustainability science: trying to advance our understanding about how functionally important vertebrate taxa are affected by habitat fragmentation and anthropogenic land-use change and about how biodiversity and ecosystem services can be safeguarded in the rapidly expanding agricultural areas that increasingly dominate landscapes throughout much of the tropics.
For much of my research I use bats as models, a group that due to their high species richness, ecological diversity and functional importance in tropical ecosystems has captivated me early on in my career. I have broad experience in conducting field-based ecological and conservation-related studies on bats and, to a lesser extent other taxa (birds, primates), in various tropical and temperate-zone countries.
Current research I am involved in include EcoPestSuppression, a large international research project aimed at evaluating the role of bats and birds as suppressors of rice insect pests in Guinea-Bissau, West Africa. In the UK, I am presently conducting a multi-scale assessment of the use of golf courses by bats, and also employ state-of-the-art acoustic technology to characterise biodiversity more broadly in this important urban green space type using soundscape approaches.
Areas of Supervision
Community Ecology; Landscape Ecology; Biodiversity Conservation; Vertebrate Ecology with focus on bats; Tropical Ecology; Bioacoustics and ecoacoustics
At undergraduate level, I am currently module leader for the L4 module Global Distribution of Wildlife, and I contribute to a range of other modules (e.g., L5 Ecology in Action, L6 Practical Ecology & Conservation). I also teach heavily on our L7 MSc programme in Wildlife Conservation, where I lead two modules (Global Conservation Challenges, Wildlife Conservation Dissertations) and contribute to other modules, including our overseas field course (Research Design and Delivery, Postgraduate Scholarship Skills, Field Monitoring of Biodiversity).
Qualifications
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Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice
2017 -
PhD in Ecology
2007 -
MSc (Diploma) in Biology
2003