Don J. Melnick (June 2, 1953 – April 18, 2019) was an environmental biologist and conservationist. He held the position of
Thomas Hunt Morgan Professor of Conservation Biology at
Columbia University, where he was also professor of
anthropology and
biological sciences.
He served as the founding Executive Director of the
Center for Environmental Research and Conservation
The Earth Institute Center for Environmental Sustainability (EICES, pronounced ), formerly known as the Center for Environmental Research and Conservation (CERC), consists of two institutions located at Columbia University. The first is an Earth ...
(CERC), a consortium of organizations including Columbia, the
American Museum of Natural History
The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...
, the
New York Botanical Garden, the
Wildlife Conservation Society, and the EcoHealth Alliance. He also served as co-chair of the
United Nations Millennium Task Force on Environmental Sustainability, charged with reporting on the
Millennium Development Goals for global
environmental sustainability to the
Secretary General.
Melnick received his Ph.D. in Physical Anthropology from
Yale in 1981, and became one of Columbia's youngest tenured faculty members, as well as the youngest person ever to serve as chair of Columbia's Anthropology Department. For six years (1988-1994), he lived in one of Columbia's undergraduate dormitories as faculty-in-residence. He died at the age of 65 in 2019.
References
External links
Melnick bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Melnick, Don
Columbia University faculty
Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory people
2019 deaths
1953 births