Wageningen University appoints Professor of Behavioural Ecology

Wageningen University appoints Professor of Behavioural Ecology

Wageningen University, part of Wageningen UR, has appointed Dr Marc Naguib as Professor of Behavioural Ecology as from 1 December. This is a new chair. At present Dr Naguib works for the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW).

In the opinion of Wageningen University, the organisation has a great need for a full chair in the field of animal behaviour for both domesticated and wild animals. Education in the field of behavioural ecology makes a major contribution to the university’s important study programmes Animal Sciences, Biology, and Forest and Nature Conservation.
Right now, education and research within the field of animal behaviour takes place at several Wageningen University locations.

Education and research in the field of behavioural ecology focuses in particular on the evolution of the differences in behaviour among individual animals, populations, and species; and the gradual adaptation of this behaviour. This relates more to why animals behave as they do than to how they behave. Within Professor Naguib’s teaching and research remit, he will particularly focus on the adaptation of behaviour to the environment and how evolution affects this.
A specific aspect of the remit also involves the use of ecological knowledge about natural behaviour to design careful livestock farming. As such, the chair group will form an important part of the Animal Welfare & Adaptation Centre, in which Wageningen University and Wageningen Livestock Research work together in the field of animal welfare.

Mark Naguib (born in Kiel, Germany, in 1964) studied biology in Berlin and earned his doctorate in 1995 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the United States. Since 2008 he has been a senior researcher in animal ecology with the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) and in 2010 he was a Visiting Professor at the Université Paris Ouest in Nanterre.