Hillary Young
Harvard University · Environmental Health
Active 1897–2016
About
Hillary Young is an associate professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology at the University of California Santa Barbara. She is a community ecologist whose research focuses on the cascading effects of wildlife decline and land use change, particularly as they impact human health and well-being. Hillary completed her undergraduate degree in ecology and evolutionary biology at Princeton University, earned a Master's degree in environmental management from Yale University's School of Forestry and the Environment, and received her PhD in biology from Stanford University in 2010. Her doctoral dissertation examined the effects and mechanisms of small changes in community composition on the ecological structure and function of terrestrial communities in the central Pacific. As a Harvard University Center for the Environment (HUCE) Ziff Environmental Fellow from 2011 to 2013, Hillary continued her research on the indirect effects of wildlife declines, especially the loss of large mammals in Africa, on human disease risk. Her work, supported by faculty hosts Dr. Charles Nunn and Dr. Marc Lipsitch, integrated field ecology with epidemiology and land use change models to explore how the reduction of large wildlife populations and associated land-use alterations can increase human disease risk through indirect trophic effects on small mammal host communities and their ectoparasites. Her research aims to deepen understanding of the ecological and land-use mechanisms influencing human health, which is essential for informing conservation and public health strategies.
Research topics
- Medicine
- Urology
- Surgery
- General surgery
- Gynecology
Frequent coauthors
- 21 shared
Niall M. Heney
Massachusetts General Hospital
- 17 shared
Alex F. Althausen
Harvard University
- 15 shared
William U. Shipley
Massachusetts General Hospital
- 13 shared
Donald S. Kaufman
Massachusetts General Hospital
- 12 shared
George R. Prout
- 12 shared
Barbara Bassil
- 9 shared
Anthony L. Zietman
Mass General Brigham
- 9 shared
Francis McGovern
Labs
Education
Ph.D., Biology
Stanford University
Awards & honors
- Ziff Environmental Fellow: 2011-2013
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