Shermin de Silva

Assistant Professor

Starting July 2022

  • Research area
    Ecology
  • History

    University of Pennsylvania, 2010, PhD
    University of California, Berkeley, BA

I study the behavioral ecology and demography of Asian elephants, and currently direct the Udawalawe Elephant Research Project in Sri Lanka, which I initiated in 2005.

I am also a founder and trustee of EFECT, Sri Lanka, and a member of the Asian Elephant Specialist Group of the IUCN Species Survival Commission.

My postdoctoral fellowships include the Smithsonian Institution, the College of Life Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Berlin, and Colorado State University — in the Department of Fish Wildlife and Conservation Biology.