Dr. Atul Joshi

Dr. Atul Joshi's picture
Dr. Atul Joshi
Fellow in Residence
atul.joshi@atree.org
Real name: 
Dr. Atul Joshi

Research interests

I am interested in working towards sustainable management and conservation of forest and grassy/open ecosystems. My research interests lie in forest resource governance and management, community and ecosystems ecology, plant invasion biology and restoration ecology. I am currently examining the role of biotic (grazing, plant resource harvest) and abiotic (fire, climate, soil) factors in the sustainable management and conservation of Community Forest Resource (CFR) areas in central India. I am also investigating the role of forest resource governance and policies in the sustainable management and conservation of terrestrial ecosystems in central India and the northern Western Ghats. My research, spanning across different spatio-temporal scales, adopts interdisciplinary approaches and tends to incorporate in-situ experimental methods, where appropriate, to address the research questions. 

I am equally interested in disseminating scientific information, especially in the vernacular, to bring about better environmental awareness, which, I believe, should go hand in hand with research. 

Education

I was brought up in the highly diverse landscapes of Western Ghats in Maharastra and, since then, have been interested in understanding the intricate relationships between forests, wildlife and people living in such remote places. I did my BSc from Shivaji University, Kolhapur. After a short stint in journalism, I did an MSc in Forestry from Forest Research Institute, Dehradun, in 2006 and studied coffee invasion in rainforest fragments of Anamalai hills in the Western Ghats for the dissertation. I then worked on large mammal distribution and human-wildlife interactions in the northern Western Ghats as a Research Affiliate with Nature Conservation Foundation, Mysore, during 2007-2010. I completed my PhD on the role of climate and humans in spatio-temporal dynamics of shola (forest) -grassland landscape mosaics in the high-elevation Western Ghats at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru, in 2019. I worked on ecological aspects of Community Forest Resource (CFR) management as a Post Doctoral Research Associate at ATREE from 2019 to 2022. 

 

Positions held (post PhD)

  • Fellow in Residence, Centre for Environment and Development, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, Bengaluru,  October 2022 - to date

  • Post Doctoral Research Associate, Centre for Environment and Development, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, Bengaluru, October 2019 - September 2022

  • Bridging Post Doctoral Fellow, National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru, October 2018 - September 2019 

Honours/Awards 

  • John L Harper Early Career Researcher Award, by the British Ecological Society, UK, 2021

  • Alice-Murphy Award for Excellence in Research at Tropical Ecology Congress, Dehradun, India, 2007

Grants

  • American Jewish World Service Grant, 2021 (Co-PI)

  • The Research Innovation Grant, 2020 (Co-PI)

  • The 44th New Phytologist Symposium, Accra, Ghana Travel grant, 2016

  • The Miriam Rothschild Internship Grant, UK,  2016

  • The Rufford Small Grant for Nature Conservation, UK,  2008

Talks/Workshops

  • Critical Wildlife Habitat: interpretation, mis-implementation and the real challenges. Talk. IASC Forest Commons Virtual Conference, 2021 

  • Frost and freezing temperatures maintain forests and grasslands as alternate states in a montane tropical forest-grassland mosaic; but alien tree invasion and climate change can disrupt these mosaics. Talk & Poster. 44th New Phytologist Symposium, Accra, Ghana, 2019

  • Global climate change poses an extinction threat to tropical grasslands: An experimental study from the unique forest - grassland mosaics of India's Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot. Talk. British Ecological Society Annual Meeting, Liverpool, UK, 2016

  • Field Experiments: a tool in plant ecology research. Workshop. Student Conference on Conservation Science, Bangalore, India. Co-organizer, 2016

  • Climate change and Acacia invasion in a biodiversity hotspot. Talk. Student Conference on Conservation Science, University of Cambridge, UK, 2016 

  • Spatio-temporal variation in the gaur-human conflict in the northern Western Ghats: A preliminary assessment. Poster. Young Ecologist Talk and Interact (YETI), Bangalore, India, 2009

  • Local perceptions of human-wildlife conflict: A preliminary survey from Sahyadri. Poster. Students meet on ecology, evolution and conservation (SMEECS), Bangalore, India, 2008 

  • Coffee invasion in Rainforest fragments of southern India. Talk. Tropical Ecology Congress, Dehradun, India, 2007 (Awarded best talk)

Publications

Journal articles

  • Date, A.A., Hiremath, A.J., Joshi, A.A. and Lele, S. (2023). Silvicultural Practices in the Management of Diospyros melanoxylon (Tendu) Leaf Production: Options and Trade-offs. Economic Botany, pp.1-18. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12231-023-09572-z 

  • Pillay, R., Miller, D. A., Raghunath, R., Joshi, A. A., Mishra, C., Johnsingh, A. J. T., & Madhusudan, M. D. (2021). Using interview surveys and multispecies occupancy models to inform vertebrate conservation. Conservation Biology. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13832 

  • Joshi, A.A., Ratnam, J. and Sankaran, M. (2020), Frost maintains forests and grasslands as alternate states in a montane tropical forest‐grassland mosaic; but alien tree invasion and warming can disrupt this balance. Journal of Ecology. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2745.13239. 

  • Joshi, A. A., Ratnam, J., Paramjyothi, H. and Sankaran, M. (2018). Climate and vegetation collectively drive soil respiration in montane forest-grassland landscapes of the southern Western Ghats, India. bioRxiv, 486324. https://doi.org/10.1101/486324.   

  • Joshi, A. A., Sankaran, M. and Ratnam, J. (2018). 'Foresting' the grassland: Historical management legacies in forest-grassland mosaics in southern India, and lessons for the conservation of tropical grassy biomes. Biological Conservation, 224, pp.144-152. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2018.05.029.

  • Joshi, A. A., Mudappa, D. and Raman, T.S. (2015). Invasive alien species in relation to edges and forest structure in tropical rainforest fragments of the Western Ghats. Tropical Ecology, 56(2), pp.233-244. ISSN 0564-3295. 

  • Pillay, R., Miller, D. A., Hines, J. E., Joshi, A. A. and Madhusudan, M. D. (2014). Accounting for false positives improves estimates of occupancy from key informant interviews. Diversity and Distributions, 20(2), pp.223-235. https://doi.org/10.1111/ddi.12151.  

  • Joshi, A. A., Mudappa, D. and Raman, T.S. (2009). Brewing trouble: coffee invasion in relation to edges and forest structure in tropical rainforest fragments of the Western Ghats, India. Biological invasions, 11(10), p.2387. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-009-9423-6. 

Reports

  • Lele, S., N. P. Broome, A. Joshi, A. Chettri, M. Tatpati and S. Mokashi (2020). Critical Wildlife Habitat: What is it, how should it be implemented, and how is it being pushed through? Centre for Environment & Development, ATREE, Bengaluru and Kalpavriksh.

Theses

  • Joshi A. A., 2019. The role of climate and humans on the structure and function of forest-grassland mosaics in the southern Western Ghats, India. PhD Thesis. (Mentor: Prof. Mahesh Sankaran)

  • Joshi A. A., 2006. Assessment of edge effect and forest structure on the occurrence and abundance of coffee in rainforest fragments of the southern Western Ghats, India. MSc Thesis. (Mentor: Dr TR Shankar Raman)

Popular writings (Selected)

 

Press Coverage

Programme: 
Forests & Governance
Projects: 
Action Research and Policy Support on Community Forest Resource management in Central India
Applied experimental ecology to investigate and promote sustainable and bio-diversity-friendly livestock grazing practices in Community Forest Resource (CFR) areas of Vidarbha, Maharashtra

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