Samrat Mondol, a PhD student in Uma Ramakrishnan's lab was recently chosen for the prestigious Fulbright-Nehru Doctoral and Professional Research Fellowship. This will fund his visit the University of Washington for the next nine months.  Samrat will be provided with a scholarship, stipend and air travel to conduct research, audit courses and gain experience from the research milieu at the University.

Fulbright Fellows must have a distinguished professional record, and in Samrat's case the evidence lies in an extraordinarily productive research project on the biology and conservation of large carnivores. His work, bridging genetics and conservation science, has led to a much better understanding of the nature and management requirements of tiger populations in India, and globally. Tigers have suffered massive declines in population size and habitat range due to severe anthropogenic impacts in the form of habitat loss, prey depletion and hunting. Samrat's work has shown that Indian tigers still retain more than 70% of genetic variation despite an over 95% decline over last two centuries. Broadening his focus to study leopards, which are similarly threatened, Samrat has demonstrated that they also retain a high level of genetic variation despite a 80% drop  in population size. His work has been published in highly rated journals, including PloS Genetics. Being a pioneer in the application of genetic identification to the field of ecology, Samrat has aided management and enforcement agencies such as the Forest Department by identifying  the species, sex and genetic origin of confiscated animal samples.

As a part of his prestigious scholarship, Samrat aims to conduct cutting-edge research on the effects of human disturbance of the behavior and reproduction of tigers. He will use non-invasive analyses of tiger feces to measure a range of hormones involved in physiological stress and reproductive functions. By comparing samples from across a range of habitats, he will try to determine if  human disturbance has a demographic impact.These studies, in combination with the findings from the existing individual tiger genetics program, should yield a more holistic assessment of the future of Indian tigers.

Samrat recently attended a meeting for the Indian recipients of the Fulbright Fellowship, where he had a chance to mingle with his peers and learn more about the program. Here, he was chosen to represent India at a global Fulbright scholars meeting, to be held in August in Miami, USA.