University of California, Davis
USA
Dr. James R. Carey, distinguished professor of entomology at the University of California, Davis, is the world’s foremost authority on arthropod demography. He has authored more than 250 scientific articles, including landmark papers in Science that shaped the way scientists think about lifespan limits and actuarial aging, and two articles in the Annual Review series that provide new syntheses on insect biodemography (2003, Annual Review of Entomology) and aging in the wild (2014, Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics). He directed a $10-million, multi-university grant for more than a decade (2003-2013).
His three books include Applied Demography for Biologists with Special Emphasis on Insects (Oxford University Press), the go-to source for all entomologists studying demography. In 2014, Professor Carey received the C. W. Woodworth Award, the highest honor bestowed by the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America (ESA), and the 2014 UC Davis Academic Senate Distinguished Teaching Award for innovative and creative teaching. He is a fellow of four professional organizations: ESA, the Gerontological Society of America, the California Academy of Sciences, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Dr. Carey is the first entomologist to have a mathematical discovery named after him by demographers – the Carey Equality — which set the theoretical and analytical foundation for a new approach to understanding wild populations. Dr. Carey received his bachelor’s degree (animal ecology, 1973) and master’s degree (entomology, 1975) from Iowa State University, and his doctorate in entomology from UC Berkeley in 1980.