Jeffrey Richards appointed head of UBC Zoology

Dr. Jeffrey Richards, an expert on how organisms respond to environmental change and former chair of UBC’s Animal Care Committee, has been appointed head of UBC Zoology, effective July 1. He replaces Dr. Vanessa Auld in the role after a five-year term.

The Richards lab focuses on understanding the physiological, biochemical and molecular mechanisms that define how organisms respond to changes in their environment. In particular, the team is interested in the evolution of low oxygen tolerance among diverse organisms, and the factors that allow some organisms to maintain function in oxygen-limiting conditions.

“UBC Zoology has built on an excellent foundation with the recent addition of high-quality researchers and renewed teaching and learning spaces,” says Dr. Meigan Aronson, Dean, UBC Science. “Jeff brings with him a very strong research, teaching and service record, and I look forward to working with him to continue the department’s successful trajectory.”

“I also want to thank Vanessa for stewarding the department so thoughtfully since 2018. Her leadership has enabled the recruitment of outstanding researchers, the completion of major new UBC life sciences teaching and learning spaces, shepherded UBC Zoology through a pandemic, and driven diversity in both the department’s research interests and faculty complement.”

Dr. Richards has published 111 peer-reviewed articles in high quality journals and received more than $12 million in competitive grant funding. He was the University of New Brunswick 2018 AJ Wiggs Memorial Lecturer, and awarded a UBC Killam Faculty Research Fellowship, the President's Medal for Research by the UK Society for Experimental Biology, and the Boutilier New Investigator Award from the Canadian Society of Zoologists. He earned his Masters with the Department of Biology, University of Waterloo and his PhD with the Department of Biology, McMaster University. From 2017 to 2022, Dr. Richards chaired UBC’s Animal Care Committee, and he has also served on UBC Science’s promotion and tenure committee.

Established in 1924, UBC Zoology has expanded to become one of the strongest and most broadly-based life science departments in Canada, helping to underpin UBC’s top national rankings in the natural, life and animal sciences.

UBC zoologists explore a range of research questions across the life sciences—evolutionary biology, ecology and conservation biology, comparative physiology, and cell and developmental biology. They include fellows of the Royal Society of London, members of the US National Academy of Sciences, fellows of the Royal Society of Canada, Canada Research Chairs, a Canada 150 chair, and recent winners of the Crafoord Prize in Biosciences and the Volvo Environment Prize.

The Zoology head search committee consisted of Dr. Agnes Lacombe, Dr. Darren Irwin, Dr. Kota Mizumoto, Dr. Ben Matthews, Dr. Martin Hirst, Olga Tosin, graduate student Aaron Klymasz-Swartz, and undergraduate student Wania Khan.