Dr. Charles Nilon
Assoc. Prof. of Urban Wildlife Management, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences
University of Missouri-Columbia

Biography
I received my Ph.D. at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. I've been at the University of Missouri-Columbia since 1989. My research considers the impact of urbanization on wildlife habitats, populations, and communities. Included in this research are projects ranging in location and degree of development from inner city neighborhoods in St. Louis and Baltimore to rapidly urbanizing areas in southern Boone County, Missouri. My graduate students and I are studying how different types of urban development impact habitat patches and the wildlife communities associated with them. Since 1997, I have been a collaborator on the Baltimore Ecosystem Study. The project in Baltimore and a similar one in Phoenix are the first two urban ecosystems included in the National Science Foundation's Long Term Ecological Research program. My work with the BES focuses on understanding how physical, ecological, and socioeconomic factors influence the abundance and composition of vertebrate species.

Because urban areas are homes for people as well as wildlife, my research also considers the role of nature as part of an individual's day-to-day environment. My students and I have worked with a community development group in St. Louis on a study determining how people perceive open spaces in their neighborhood. I am working with colleagues in Fisheries and Wildlife on a study of resident based assessment of the vegetation of several Columbia, Missouri neighborhoods.

Selected Publications
Middendorf, G., B. Grant, J. Cubit, G. Love, C. Nilon, G. Peterson, L.M. Jablonski, and T.C. Poling. 2003. The challenge of environmental justice. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 1:154-160.

Nilon, C.H., A.R. Berkowitz, and K.S. Hollweg. 2003. Ecosystem understanding is a key to understanding cities. Pages 1-13 in, A.R. Berkowitz, C.H. Nilon, and K.S. Hollweg, eds. Understanding urban ecosystems: a new frontier for science and education. Springer, New York.

Pickett, STA, ML Cadenasso, JM Grove, CH Nilon, RV Pouyat, WC Zipperer, and R Costanza. 2001. Urban ecological systems: Linking terrestrial ecology, physical, and socioeconomic components of metropolitan areas. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics. 32:127-157.

Azerrad, J. M. and C. H. Nilon. 2001. Avian community characteristics of urban greenspaces in St. Louis, Missouri, p. 489-509. In J. M. Marzluff, R. Bowman, and R. E. Donnelly, Avian ecology and conservation in an urbanizing world. Kluwer Academic, Boston.

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