Biography

I am an Associate Researcher at the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. My research focuses on native forest ecosystems and their biodiversity in the context of global change. I am particularly interested in the conservation of hyperdiverse tropical forests that face accelerating threats from land-use and climate change. While much of my current work uses ecological modelling of biodiversity ‘big data’ coupled with remotely-sensed imagery, I have strong field ecology roots with over three years of cumulative field research experience in Borneo and India. I completed my Ph.D. in 2016 at the University of Florida, followed by a postdoc at the University of Northern British Columbia.

Editorial Roles

• Environmental Research: Ecology (2022 – Present)

Selected Publications

1. Pillay, R.*, Watson, J.E.M., Hansen, A.J., Burns, P., Virnig, A.L.S., Supples, C., Armenteras, D., González-del-Pliego, P., Aragon-Osejo, J., Jantz, P.A., Ervin, J., Goetz, S.J. & Venter, O. (2024). Global rarity of high-integrity tropical rainforests for threatened and declining terrestrial vertebrates. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 121, e2413325121.

2. Pillay, R.*, Watson, J.E.M., Hansen, A.J., Jantz, P.A., Aragon-Osejo, J., Armenteras, D., Atkinson, S.C., Burns, P., Ervin, J., Goetz, S.J., González-del-Pliego, P., Robinson, N.P., Supples, C., Virnig, A.L.S.., Williams, B.A. & Venter, O. (2022). Humid tropical vertebrates are at lower risk of extinction and population decline in forests with higher structural integrity. Nature Ecology & Evolution 6, 1840-1849.

3. Pillay, R.*, Venter, M., Aragon-Osejo, J., González-del-Pliego, P., Hansen, A.J., Watson, J.E.M. & Venter, O. (2022). Tropical forests are home to over half of the world’s vertebrate species. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 20, 10-15.

4. Pillay, R.*, Miller, D.A.W., Raghunath, R., Joshi, A.A., Mishra, C., Johnsingh, A.J.T. & Madhusudan, M.D. (2022). Using interview surveys and multispecies occupancy models to inform vertebrate conservation. Conservation Biology 36, e13832.

5. Pillay, R.*, Fletcher, R.J., Sieving, K.E., Udell, B.J. & Bernard, H. (2019). Bioacoustic monitoring reveals shifts in breeding songbird populations and singing behaviour with selective logging in tropical forests. Journal of Applied Ecology 56, 2482-2492.