The Behavioral Ecology of the Tibetan Macaque

Prof. Jin-Hua Li (Ph.D., Peking University - Department of Psychology, 1998) is a Vice-President and Professor of Hefei Normal University and Professor and Head & PI of Primate Research Group of Anhui University. For over three decades, he has dedicated to primate research (with special interest in behavioral ecology and social evolution) and conducted field studies on the Tibetan macaque for 33 continuous years in Huangshan, China since 1986. With more than 80 original research articles, he also authored two academic books, one of which is The Tibetan Macaque Society: A Field Study, which is well read in especially China and Japan. His research accomplishments have led to invitations from several universities in the US and Japan (including University of Washington, Central Washington University, Emory University, and Kyoto University). He has also served the editorial boards of several academic journals including Current Zoology and Journal of Mammalogy (Acta Theriologica Sinica).  Prof. Lixing Sun (Ph.D., State University of New York - College of Environmental Science and Forestry, 1996) is a behavioral ecologist and evolutionary biologist who has worked on a variety of species including deer, rodents, pandas, birds, and amphibians before focusing on primates in 2004. His current research lies in primate social structure, social networks, and social cognition with a long-term goal of a better understanding of human nature and human societies from an evolutionary perspective. He has authored/co-authored more than 60 original research papers nine book chapters, and four books including the acclaimed Beaver: -Life History of a Wetland Engineer (Cornell University Press, 2004) and The Fairness Instinct (Prometheus Books, 2013). He also served as Associate Editor for Current Zoology and is an editorial board member of several academic journals. Prof. Peter Kappeler (Ph.D., Duke University, 1992) holds a chair for Sociobiology/Anthropology at the University of Göttingen and is the head of the Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology Unit at the German Primate Center. He studied Biology and Psychology at the University of Tübingen and at Duke University. As a postdoc, he worked at the German Primate Center and obtained his Habilitation in Tropical Ecology from the University of Würzburg. Before moving to his present position, he was the head of the Behavioral Ecology Department at Leipzig University. His research interests focus on the social systems of non-human primates. For the past 25 years, his empirical work has focused on the social and mating systems of Malagasy primates, carnivores and birds, which he and his students have been studying at Kirindy Forest. He has authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers in top scientific journals, and authored or edited 15 books and special issues, including The Lemurs of Madagascar and a (German) textbook on animal behavior. He is a long-term editor of the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.