Lisa Curran

Lisa Curran is a tropical biologist who combines expertise in ecological processes with keen insight into the realities of forest communities. Focusing her research on the forests of Indonesian Borneo and the ecology of its most economically important family of timber, Dipterocarpaccae, Curran works across disciplines and sectors to devise new strategies to address deforestation and its devastating environmental consequences. Lisa Curran received an A.B. (1984) in anthropology from Harvard University and a Ph.D. (1994) in ecology and evolutionary biology from Princeton University. She was a Mercer Post-doctoral Fellow at Harvard University (1994-1996) and an assistant professor in the Department of Biology and the School of Natural Resources and the Environment at the University of Michigan (1996-2001). In 2001, she became an associate professor at Yale University’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and was promoted to professor in 2006; she also serves as the John Musser Director of Yale’s Tropical Resource Institute. In addition to her academic affiliations, Curran has worked as a consultant for numerous international organizations and governmental agencies in South and Southeast Asia.