Researchers

Scientists who have conducted research at the Ankoatsifaka Research Station:

Rebecca Lewis

Dr. Lewis is Director of the Ankoatsifaka Research Station, Director of the Sifaka Research Project and Professor of Anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin.

Anne Axel

Dr. Axel is Associate Professor of Biology at Marshall University. She is currently studying fire ecology and soundscapes in Kirindy Mitea National Park. She is expanding upon her landscape ecology research in and around Beza Mahafaly Special Reserve.

Katherine Bannar-Martin

Dr. Bannar-Martin conducted exploratory research on the lemur community ecology of Kirindy Mitea while a PhD student at the University of Texas at Austin.

Meredith Barrett

Dr. Barrett, formerly of Duke University, studied mouse lemur health as part of her larger project on lemur health and conservation.

Mary Blanchard

Dr. Blanchard of the University of Birmingham studied the locomotor behavior and ecology of lemurs and fosa.

Damien Caillaud

Dr. Caillaud is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of California at Davis. He is interested in the evolution of large mammal societies and the epidemiology of infectious diseases in social mammals. His research at Kirindy Mitea examined social networks of Verreaux’s sifaka.

Santiago Cassalett

Santi Cassalett studied the nutritional ecology of three lemur species in Kirindy Mitea National Park and Ranomafana National Park as a PhD student at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Simon Furnell

Dr. Furnell, studied the locomotor ecology of several species of lemurs as a PhD student at the University of Manchester.

Edward Louis

Dr. Louis is director of the Conservation Genetics Department at Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium and founder of the Madagascar Biodiversity Partnership. He and MBP periodically work with the Sifaka Research Project and are studying the nocturnal lemur community in Kirindy Mitea.

Elvis Rakotomalala

Elvis Rakotomalala studied the nocturnal lemur community of Kirindy Mitea National Park and the biogeography of southern Menabe for his Ph.D. as a student at the University of Antananarivo .

Felana Rakotondranaivo

Felana Rakotondranaivo conducted her D.E.A. research on scent marking in Verreaux’s sifaka as a student at the University of Antananarivo.

Fidy Rasambainarivo

Dr. Rasambainarivo, DVM., Ph.D., is a wildlife veterinarian. He is interested in the ecological approaches of health and particularly the “One Health” concept and “Conservation Medicine” to study the multiple interactions between human, domestic animal and wildlife health in Madagascar. He is involved with the Sifaka Research Project as a veterinarian, darter, and in the investigation of Verreaux’s sifaka health.

Domenic Romanello

Dom Romanello is a PhD student at the University of Texas at Austin. He is studying the effectiveness of national parks in protecting biodiversity and improving human well-being using Kirindy Mitea National Park as a test case.

Amanda Perofsky

Dr. Perofsky completed her PhD at the University of Texas at Austin in 2018. Her research used a combination of behavioral field observations, molecular techniques, and epidemiological math modeling to characterize the temporal and hierarchical contact patterns exhibited by Verreaux’s sifaka and their impacts on intestinal bacteria transmission.

Stacey Tecot

Dr. Stacey Tecot is an Associate Professor and Director of the Laboratory for the Evolutionary Endocrinology of Primates at the University of Arizona. She studies the evolutionary endocrinology and conservation biology of primates, with a special focus on red-bellied lemurs in Ranomafana National Park. She is studies the socioendocrinology of Propithecus verreauxi in Kirindy Mitea NP.

Carrie Veilleux

Dr. Veilleux is an Assistant Professor of Anatomy at Midwestern University and is interested in primate and human sensory ecology. She has studied light environments and visual ecology of lemurs at Kirindy Mitea.

Lucas Schauer

Lucas Schauer of Oxford Brookes University conducted his MSc dissertation research at the Ankoatsifaka Research Station over the dry season of 2022. His project was to analyze how researcher-established trails like the gridded trail system at Ankoatsifaka impact the behavior of the Verreaux’s Sifaka, with emphasis on anti-predator behaviors and low-stress behaviors like grooming and resting. Lucas’s project will hopefully be able to guide the Madagascar National Park system and future research stations in how to establish trail systems that only minimally affect the lemurs in the area.

Meredith Lutz

Meredith Lutz is a Ph.D. student in the Animal Behavior Graduate Group at UC Davis. Her research examines the ecological drivers of social plasticity in primates. At Ankoatsifaka, she studies the temporal and spatial dynamics of affiliation for a comparison with the lemur community in the Maromizaha Forest.

Ravakiniaina Rambeloson

Ravaka Rambeloson is a Ph.D. student at the University of Antananarivo studying sifaka feeding ecology and phenology for her dissertation.