William Sutherland (biologist)

William James Sutherland (born 27 April 1956) is the Miriam Rothschild Professor of Conservation Biology at the University of Cambridge. He is currently the President of the British Ecological Society. He is also a fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge since 2008.

Prof Sutherland's research interests largely involve predicting the consequences of environmental change. He is known for his research on integrating science and policy particularly in the field of evidence-based conservation. Over the last three decades, his research has spanned several disciplines. Two of his key contributions have been the horizon scanning exercises to identify future priority issues and the 100 important questions in various disciplines (ecology, poverty prevention, global agriculture and food amongst others. He has also worked extensively on bird population ecology and the biodiversity impacts of agriculture.

He has been cited 23,955 times and has an i10 index of 277.

Prof Sutherland was awarded the Natural Environment Research Council postdoctoral fellowship to join Wolfson College, Oxford in 1980–82. After completing his post doctoral research he joined the School of Environmental Sciences in the University of East Anglia in 1983 and went on to hold a professorship in Biology from 1996–2006 in the School of Biological Sciences. He was also a trustee of Fauna & Flora International from 1998 to 2006.

• Scientific Medal, Zoological Society of London, 1997;
• Marsh Award for Ecology, British Ecological Society, 2001;
• Marsh Award for Conservation Biology, Zoological Society of London, 2005;
• Ecological Engagement Award, British Ecological Society, 2012;
• Distinguished Service Award, Society for Conservation Biology, 2013;
• Sir John Burnett Memorial Lecture Medal, 2013

• (PDF) http://www.zsl.org/sites/default/files/media/2014-07/ZSL%20Scientific%20Medal_previous%20winners_0.pdf. 
• http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/grants-awards/honours_awards_prizes/marsh-award-for-ecology/. 
• (PDF) http://static.zsl.org/files/marsh-cons-biol-winners-2008-806.pdf. 
• http://www.nbn.org.uk/The-NBN/What-is-the-NBN/NBN-Timeline.aspx. 

He has authored two books: The Conservation Handbook and From Individual Behaviour to Population Biology. In addition, he has also edited the following books: Managing Habitats for Conservation, Ecological Census Techniques, Behaviour and Conservation, Conservation Science and Action and Bird Ecology and Conservation: a Handbook of Techniques. He has also co-authored the summaries on amphibian, bird, bee and farmland conservation, ,.

A gratis book scheme that he established has given away more than 5000 books to 137 countries.