Role
Associate Professor of Conservation Biology
Dr Uzal teaches in the MSc/MRes Applied Ecology and Geospatial Techniques course and is currently supervising nine PhD candidates, three as Director of Studies. Dr Uzal is the chair of the ARES Research Ethics Committee.
Career overview
Dr Uzal obtained his undergraduate and masters degrees in Spain. Following this he worked as a freelance consultant in wolf conservation in Spain. In the UK Dr Uzal has worked for Reading University and The Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust studying the impacts of farming on invertebrates biodiversity.
Dr Uzal's doctorate was obtained from Bournemouth University, with his research focused on the ecology and impacts of Sika deer (Cervus nippon) on lowland heath plant and animal communities.
After gaining his doctorate Dr Uzal collaborated as Postdoctoral Researcher with the University of Saskatchewan examining the population dynamics and resource use of feral horses on the Sable Island (Nova Scotia, Canada). He has also worked as freelance Adviser for The Deer Initiative. He joined NTU in 2013.
Dr Uzal is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (HEA) and a Full member of the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management (CIEEM)
Research areas
During the last 20 years, Dr Uzal has worked on a number of different projects, including:
- Monitoring grey wolf (Canis Lupus) and brown bear (Ursus arctos) populations across Europe.
- Environmental impact assessments
- Effects of farming on biodiversity of invertebrates
- Use of telemetry techniques (radio and GPS tracking) to study habitat use and ecology of Sika deer (Cervus nippon)
- Effects of grazing and browsing by a large herbivore on plant and animal communities of lowland heath
- Analysis of deer-vehicle collisions in relation to traffic and landscape characteristics
- Population dynamics and resource selection of feral horses on Sable Island (Nova Scotia, Canada)
- Ecotoxicology of brown bear
Dr Uzal's current research areas of interest include Impacts of human disturbance on wildlife, conservation and management of game species, carnivores and endangered species, spatial ecology landscape ecology, remote sensing, relationship plant-herbivores, animal behaviour, population dynamics, telemetry, remote sensing, bioacoustics and restoration ecology.
Current collaborative projects:
- Restoration Ecology. Collaboration with the Center for Ecosystem Restoration Kenya.
- Monitoring of restored and degraded ecosystems. Funded by The Earthwatch Institute.
- Brown Bear ecology. Collaboration with the Biodiversity Research Institute/ University of Oviedo (Spain) and The National Institute for Research and Development in Forestry Marin Dracea (Romania)
- One Mara Research Hub. Member of the Advisory Council.
Current PhD candidates:
- Rachael Leeman (Started 2021): Monitoring wildlife populations using tourist photographs.
- Katie Davies (Started 2021): The consequences of captivity on the behaviour of hedgehogs.
- Consolata Gathoni Gitau (Started 2023): Use of passive acoustic monitoring to evaluate restored and degraded tropical savannah ecosystems in Africa. <Director of Studies>
- Paulina Pawlikowska (Started 2023): Camera trap-based monitoring of the West European Hedgehog- detecting trends in population size.
- Maria del Pino Garcia Sanchez (Started 2023): Accounting for individual variability in landscape connectivity modelling: An integrative framework to identify spatial priorities for brown bear (Ursus arctos) conservation across Europe. <Director of Studies>
- Saskia Goeckeritz (Started 2023): An Assessment of Anthropogenic and Environmental Pressures on Peatland Surfaces in Ireland.
- Alex Nduah Nderi (Started 2024): Social-ecological approaches for ecosystem restoration in the Maasai Mara, Kenya. <Director of Studies>
- Matthew Jones (Started 2024): West European Hedgehog Spatial Ecology and Translocation Dynamics.
- Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya (Started 2025): The spatial ecology and climate resilience of Andean bears across an elevation gradient.
Past PhD candidates:
- Helle Hydeskov (2024, Director of Studies): Exposure and impacts of lead (Pb) in Scandinavian brown bears (Ursus arctos)
- Beth Smith (2024, Director of Studies): Interactions between livestock guarding dogs and wildlife in the Carpathian Mountains, Romania
- Shashank Balakrishna (2023): Barn owl breeding in agricultural landscapes of Great Britain
- Anthony Seveque (2021, Director of Studies): From global to local: impacts of human disturbance on niche partitioning among carnivores
- Jessica Schaus-Calderon (2021): Responses of the European hedgehog to urbanisation: impact on population dynamics, animal movement and habitat selection
- Katie Lee (2021): Untangling the roles of prey availability, habitat quality and predation as predictors of hedgehog abundance
- Robert Davis (2021): The status and behavioural ecology of large carnivores in a human-impacted miombo woodland
Further opportunities exist to undertake postgraduate research towards an MPhil/PhD or MSc by research in the broad areas of ecology, ecosystem restoration, and human-wildlife conflict. Further information regarding MPhil/PhD study may be obtained from the NTU Graduate School.
Sponsors and collaborators
Current research is being conducted with the funding of The Earthwatch Institute, People's Trust for Endangered Species , British Hedgehog Preservation Society
Publications
Publications last 3 years:
Patowary, K., Uzal, A., & Fattebert, J. (2026). Quantitative targets for leopard conservation in sub‐Saharan Africa. Journal of Applied Ecology, 63(7), e70447. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.70447
Major, T., Uzal, A., Hill, R. A., & Diaz, A. (2026). A spatial analysis workflow to derive landscape‐scale conservation management information from GPS ‐monitored grazing livestock. Ecological Solutions and Evidence, 7(3). https://doi.org/10.1002/2688-8319.70275
Melo, F., Lohbeck, M., Ferdous, R., Di Bonito, M., Gacheri, P., Mwangi, L., Magaju, C., Nankaya, J., Siddique, I., Carmo, R., Nabaala, H. L., Nderi, A. N., Thompson, S., & Uzal, A. (2026). On the need for biocultural approaches to restoration. People and Nature. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.70362
Smith, B. R., Yarnell, R. W., Whitehouse‐Tedd, K., Marginean, M., Popa, R., Trewby, I., Faur, M., & Uzal, A. (2026). So close yet so far: movement patterns of livestock guarding dogs in a shared landscape in Romania. Ecological Solutions and Evidence, 7(2), e70245. https://doi.org/10.1002/2688-8319.70245
García‐Sánchez, P., Penteriani, V., del Mar Delgado, M., Falcinelli, D., Fedorca, A., Gentle, L. K., Kojola, I., Heikkinen, S., Find'o, S., Skuban, M., Fedorca, M., Ionescu, O., Ionescu, G., Jurj, R., Popa, M., Ordiz, A., Swenson, J. E., & Uzal, A. (2026). Anthropogenic infrastructures shape brown bear movements in human‐modified landscapes. Ecology and Evolution, 16(3), e72680. https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.72680
Davies, K., Uzal, A., Kishkinev, D., Rasmussen, S., & Scott, D. (2026). Healing the wild: a review of wildlife rehabilitation laws across 12 European countries and recommendations for strengthening regulatory frameworks. Journal of International Wildlife Law and Policy, 1-22. https://doi.org/10.1080/13880292.2026.2664306
YU, H., BARLOW, A., DAVIS, R.S., GENTLE, L.K., UZAL, A., BAKER, P.J. and YARNELL, R.W., 2025. Habitat and predator heterogeneity influence density of a declining mammal. Oikos: e11706. ISSN 0030-1299
LEEMAN, R.S., DAVIS, R.S., UZAL, A., NEUMEYER, H., GARBETT, R.A., TWINING, J.P. and YARNELL, R.W., 2025. Tourist sightings improve the precision of camera trap‐derived density estimates using spatial capture‐recapture models. Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation. ISSN 2056-3485
SMITH, B.R., WHITEHOUSE‐TEDD, K., YARNELL, R.W., MARGINEAN, M., POPA, R., MORLEY, A., TREWBY, I. and UZAL, A., 2025. Direct interactions between livestock guarding dogs and wildlife in a transhumance grazing system. Conservation Science and Practice: e70120. ISSN 2578-4854
GITAU, C., KETTEL, E., ABRAHAMS, C., WEBALA, P.W. and UZAL, A., 2025. The role of ecoacoustics in monitoring ecosystem degradation and restoration. Restoration Ecology: e70168. ISSN 1061-2971
OGUTU, J.O., STABACH, J.A., HOPCRAFT, J.G.C., ....., UZAL, A., VELDHUIS, M.P. and BUITENWERF, R., 2025. Short-term study fails to capture negative impacts of livestock intensification on wildlife. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 122 (23): e250241812. ISSN 0027-8424
LEE, K.A., UZAL, A., GENTLE, L.K., BAKER, P.J., DELAHAY, R.J., SÉVÊQUE, A., DAVIS, R.S. and YARNELL, R.W., 2025. Does differential habitat selection facilitate coexistence between badgers and hedgehogs? Ecology and Evolution, 15 (1): e70744. ISSN 2045-7758
HYDESKOV, H.B., ARNEMO, J.M., LLOYD MILLS, C., GENTLE, L.K. and UZAL, A., 2024. A global systematic review of lead exposure and its health effects in wild mammals. Journal of Wildlife Diseases. ISSN 0090-3558
RIGOUDY, N., DUSSERT, ...., UZAL, A., VAUTRAIN, V., VIMAL, R., WEBER, J., SPATARO, B., MIELE, V. and CHAMAILLÉ-JAMMES, S., 2023. The DeepFaune initiative: a collaborative effort towards the automatic identification of European fauna in camera trap images. European Journal of Wildlife Research, 69 (6): 113. ISSN 1612-4642
Press expertise
- Conservation
- Wildlife
- Hedgehogs
- Large predators
- Wildlife populations
- Use of GIS / GPS / VHF technologies to monitor wildlife
UN Sustainable Development Goals
These are my UN SDGs
