Nils Christian Stenseth

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Nils Christian Stenseth (born 29 July 1946 in Fredrikstad, Norway) is a biologist with a focus on ecology and evolution. He is the leader of the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis (CEES, [1]) at the University of Oslo. He is also the Chief Scientist at the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research ([2]) in Norway. In December 2006, CEES was given Centre of Excellence (Senter for fremragende forskning) status by the Norwegian Research Council.

Stenseth finished his first degree in 1972 with main topics Biology, Zoology and Mathematics. He then became a student of John Maynard Smith, still working mostly on the theoretical aspects of evolution and ecology. Major publications from this period is his work on the Red Queen Hypothesis (Van Valen, 1973; Stenseth, 1979; Stenseth and Maynard-Smith, 1984) in addition to his work on population cycles Norwegian Lemming. He later turned to more empirical investigations, and as chair of CEES he continues to be a well-known and respected scientist within biology. He is an ISI Highly Cited researcher within Ecology/Environment ([3]).

[edit] References

• Stenseth, N. C. (1979). "Where Have All the Species Gone - Nature of Extinction and the Red Queen Hypothesis." Oikos 33(2): 196-227.
• Stenseth, N. C. and J. M. Smith (1984). "Coevolution in Ecosystems - Red Queen Evolution or Stasis." Evolution 38(4): 870-880.
• Van Valen, L. (1973). "A new evolutionary law." Evolutionary Theory 1(1): 1-30.