Aligarh: Prof Satish Kumar from the Department of Wildlife Sciences at Aligarh Muslim University has been appointed as Chairman of the department, for three years.

He has been engaged in teaching and research for the past 28 years after joining the department and has published more than 30 research papers in journals of national and international repute. The area of his research interest includes Grey Wolf in India, studying the predator-prey relationships, spatial organisation of wolf packs, dispersal from natal packs, breeding biology and variation in individual behaviour in semi-arid grassland ecosystems in the Deccan plateau while using radio-telemetry.

He received advanced training in large carnivore ecology at the Kawishiwi Field Lab, Northern Research Station of the US Forest Service and worked with Dr. L. David Mech and Dr. Michael Nelson in Superior National Forest, Minnesota.

Dr Kumar carried out a surveillance of bird diseases in collaboration with the Bombay Natural History Society to investigate bird flu in wild waterbirds in Uttar Pradesh and studied the migratory behaviour of Bar-headed Geese using satellite telemetry and bird rings. He has also worked on documentation of the faunal diversity of Baba Ghulam Shah Badshah University, Rajouri, in collaboration with its Centre for Biodiversity Studies.

He has attended several national and international conferences, symposia and training programmes.