UW primate authority elected to national academy

Karen B. Strier, a renowned primatologist and authority on Brazil’s muriqui monkeys, one of the world’s most threatened animals, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), it was announced today (May 3).

Strier, a professor of anthropology, is among 72 individuals nationwide elected to membership in the country’s preeminent honor society for scientists. Her election brings to 43 the current number of UW–Madison faculty elected to membership, the most of any public U.S. university outside of California.

Membership in NAS, a private organization founded in 1863, is among the highest honors that can be accorded an American scientist or engineer. Election of new members was held during a closed session at the group’s 142nd annual meeting. Of the new members, Strier was the only one from Wisconsin.

Strier joined the UW–Madison faculty in 1989. She is best known for her studies of muriquis or woolly spider monkeys, a critically endangered primate that inhabits the Atlantic forest of southeastern Brazil. She has made numerous trips to her long-term field site in Brazil to study the behavior and ecological requirements of the monkeys, the largest in the New World. Her work has contributed significantly to efforts to preserve the animal’s shrinking habitat.

She is the author or co-author of three books and dozens of scholarly articles. She is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and was the recipient of a Presidential Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation, in addition to many other honors.