Meredith Bastian is a biological anthropologist by training, having spent over 7 years working with wild orangutans and gibbons in Southeast Asia for her Ph.D and post-doctoral work, primarily studying the loss of cultural traditions in Bornean orangutans due to habitat loss. She has over 20 years experience working with and publishing papers about orangutans and other non-human primates, both wild and in the care of humans, in various countries and environments.
She currently serves as one of the two Recruiting editors for PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), where she works closely with NAS member scientists and other subject experts from throughout the biological, social, and physical sciences to create PNAS Special Feature collections, run Call for Papers campaigns, and facilitate member Inaugural Articles, Retrospectives, Perspectives, Nobel Profiles, and other recruited papers for the journal with a focus on increasing exposure of currently underrepresented areas and authors. She also remains active in the orangutan research and conservation communities, serving as the Orangutan SSP (Species Survival Plan)’s Research Advisor and as Board member of the Orangutan Conservancy.Â
Meredith has a B.A. in Anthropology and Psychology from Bryn Mawr College and a Ph.D. from Duke University in Biological Anthropology & Anatomy.
Contact: MBastian at nas.eduÂ
