Jeremy T. Kerr, FRSC

Professor Jeremy Kerr, PhD, FRSC, FRSB, is a leading ecologist, conservation scientist, and professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Ottawa, and a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC). This distinction recognizes him as one of Canada’s most valued and influential voices in science—an honour he earned through impactful work and international collaborations. His global partnerships have led to innovative research, including the first continent-wide studies showing how climate change is shrinking the ranges of pollinators like bumblebees across Europe and North America.

Beyond the lab, Professor Kerr’s research informs policy and drives conservation action. Early in his career, he played a key role in scientific consensus work across Ontario that contributed directly to the province’s Endangered Species Act in 2007. At the federal level, he has been involved in efforts to safeguard the Species at Risk Act and worked extensively on wilderness protection initiatives. Internationally, he co-chaired an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) working group on citizen science, helping countries worldwide to use public engagement and scientific evidence as a guide for policy.

He has a long-standing passion for conservation and the search for answers to broad-scale questions in ecology. His PhD, at York University with Laurence Packer, focused on how environmental factors affect diversity in ecosystems and began to address how human activities were affecting those patterns.

This work led to the Governor General’s Gold Medal and a postdoctoral position at the University of Oxford, with Lord Robert May and Sir Richard Southwood, where he expanded his focus on global change and the changing prospects for conservation. His work remains focused on big questions in ecology and conservation, particularly on how species respond to recent, rapid climate change and sharply rising incidence of climate-related extreme events.

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