Shane Campbell-Staton

Shane Campbell-Staton is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University, and an Associated Faculty member of the High Meadows Environmental Institute (HMEI). His research focuses on understanding how human activities drive evolutionary changes in wildlife, particularly in extreme environments such as cities, post-conflict zones, and radiation-contaminated areas.

His work explores animal performance, gene expression, and genomics in response to human-induced pressures like urbanization, climate change, poaching, pollution, and invasive species. Notable projects include studies on tuskless elephants in Gorongosa National Park, Chernobyl wolves' radiation adaptation, and urban lizard thermal tolerance.

Campbell-Staton received the 2023 Sloan Research Fellowship for his innovative research. His lab emphasizes interdisciplinary approaches, combining fieldwork, genomic analysis, and physiological experimentation. Current research directions include the biological costs of human migration, microbiome shifts in urban wildlife, and the genomic basis of rapid evolutionary responses to environmental stressors.

He collaborates widely with conservation organizations and has pioneered public science communication through films and TED talks. His team's work bridges evolutionary biology with pressing global challenges, aiming to inform conservation strategies in a rapidly changing world.