Yates to receive Sustainability Science Award
The Ecological Society of America (ESA) will present societal awards to eight distinguished ecologists at its 93rd Annual ESA meeting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in August. Among the recipients will be former University of New Mexico Vice President and Professor of Biology Dr. Terry Yates, who will receive ESA's 2007 Sustainability Science Award posthumously.
Photo: Dr. Terry Yates
The award recognizes research results that provide scientific foundations for sustainable management, link human and ecological systems and advance sustainability science.
Yates was best known for his groundbreaking research that isolated the source of the deadly Hantavirus, the serious respiratory disease that began afflicting many in the American Southwest in 1993.
In their 2002 BioScience paper, “The ecology and evolutionary history of an emergent disease: Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome,” Yates and his colleagues applied ecological science to public health to unravel the linkages between the ecology of the Hantavirus disease and climate variability, landscape patterns and human behavior.
In December 2007, at the age of 57, Yates died of brain cancer. At the time of his death, Yates was vice president for research and economic development at UNM, as well as curator of genomic resources for UNM’s Museum of Southwestern Biology.
He served as president of the Natural Science Collections Alliance from 2004–2007 where he worked tirelessly on the national stage to increase awareness of the vitally important research in biological diversity, evolution, and ecology that is conducted at our nation’s natural science collections and museums.
Yates held several positions at the National Science Foundation and was a member of the Board of Life Sciences of the National Academy of Sciences and an honorary member of the Society of Mammalogists, the highest honor bestowed by the organization.
For more information about the awards session and the 2008 ESA Annual Meeting, visit www.esa.org/milwaukee. More than 3500 attendees are expected at this year’s meeting.
Media Contact: Steve Carr, (505) 277-1821; email: scarr@unm.edu
Posted by scarr at July 15, 2008 12:42 PM