Canine Distemper in the Amur Tiger

Dr. Martin Gilbert came to Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine in 2016 as a Senior Research Associate with the Wildlife Health and Health Policy Group.

From Dr. Gilbert’s LinkedIn:

I am interested in pursuing health-related research that has direct relevance to the conservation of wildlife, particularly carnivores and scavengers. This includes approaches to understand how endangered species are impacted at a population level by infectious disease (such as canine distemper virus in free-ranging Amur tigers), as well non-infectious agents (such as the pharmaceutical diclofenac in Asian vultures). Health processes can also impact predator populations indirectly, in circumstances where disease influences the availability of prey resources. In each of these situations disease processes must be understood at a landscape scale, whether through the epidemiology of multi-host pathogens operating across the domestic-wild interface, or through the social drivers that influence the use of toxic compounds in the environment. The road to addressing these issues begins in the field, and requires a multi-disciplinary approach, drawing on a diversity of skills that includes (but is not limited to): ecology, pathology, clinical medicine, molecular biology, microbiology, toxicology, population modelling, spatial analytics, sociology and ultimately policy. By fostering such collaborative partnerships we gain a more complete understanding of wildlife health issues, creating a platform to identify practical measures to mitigate the conservation impact on species in the wild.