Keith Bildstein elected Fellow of AAAS

Keith Bildstein, Ph.D., the Sarkis Acopian Director of Conservation Science at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, has been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Bildstein was elected based upon his distinguished contributions to the fields of animal behavior, movement ecology, and conservation biology, with particular emphasis on birds of prey, and will be listed along with other 2015 fellows in this week’s issue of the journal Science.

“Keith is a scientific researcher and engaging speaker who has traveled the globe to study and conserve birds of prey worldwide,” says Hawk Mountain President Jerry Regan.

“Being named a an AAAS Fellow is a prestigious honor and I can think of no one more deserving,” he adds.

Keith joined the professional staff at Hawk Mountain in 1992 and oversees programs in Conservation Science at the Sanctuary's Acopian Center for Conservation Learning where his responsibilities include conducting local to global research on raptors and their migration ecology, coordinating research by visiting scientists and students, achieving goals set by the Science Advisors Committee, including leadership and mentorship in global raptor conservation, and directing the Conservation Science Training Program and the newly emerging Hawk Mountain Graduate Student Program. His current research includes a study of striated caracaras, a long-term study of New World vultures, and research on endangered hooded vultures in Africa, among other global collaborations that currently take him to four continents.

Keith is a member of 21 professional organizations and the author of more than 100 peer-reviewed publications. He has written several books including Migrating Raptors of the World: their ecology and conservation (2006) and recently submitted the manuscript for his latest book, How Raptors Work, to Cornell Press. When he’s not traveling, Keith can usually be found watching, studying, or reading about raptors.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world’s largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science (www.sciencemag.org) as well as Science Translational Medicine (www.sciencetranslationalmedicine.org) and Science Signaling (www.sciencesignaling.org). AAAS was founded in 1848, and includes 254 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of 1 million.