Prof. em. Dr. Peter Edwards

Peter Edwards studied botany at Cambridge University, graduating in 1970. In 1973 he obtained his Ph.D. degree, also from Cambridge, for a thesis entitled Nutrient cycling in a New Guinea montane forest. He was a lecturer/senior lecturer in ecology at the University of Southampton, England, from 1973-1993. He is professor emeritus of plant ecology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), where he has worked since 1993. From 2013 until 2017 he was director of the Singapore-ETH Centre for Global Environmental Sustainability.

 He is author of around 350 refereed scientific papers and author/editor of several books covering a wide range of environmental fields including ecosystem processes, insect–plant interactions, environmental management and biodiversity (h-factor 50). His recent research has focused particularly on large-scale processes in terrestrial ecosystems, including interactions between large herbivores and vegetation, the dynamics of vegetation on the flood plains of large rivers, biological invasions, the role of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes, and urban ecology. 

 Peter Edwards has a strong interest in the application of science and technology for better management. While at Southampton he was a director of the GeoData Institute, a contract agency undertaking environmental research and consultancy work. He was also a founder and first executive secretary of the Institute for Ecology and Environmental Management, a professional organization for environmental scientists in the UK. At ETH he was faculty coordinator and member of the executive board of the Alliance for Global Sustainability, a research partnership between several leading universities.

 Besides his research and teaching, Peter Edwards has held a number of administrative responsibilities at ETH and elsewhere. These include assistant dean of the Faculty of Science at Southampton, membership of the ETH Research Commission, Dean of Environmental Sciences (2000-2002) and Environmental Systems Science (2010-2013). He has been programme secretary of the British Ecological Society, a council member of the International Association for Ecology INTECOL, and president of the Swiss Botanical Society. Since 1997 he has been an editor of the journal Perspectives in Plant Ecology, Evolution and Systematics. Until 2024, he chaired the Sustainability Research Initiative of the Swiss Academy of Natural Sciences.