Rate My Professor Santiago Zuluaga

Dr Santiago Zuluaga Castañeda is a postdoctoral research fellow at the FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology in the Faculty of Science at the University of Cape Town. He holds a PhD from the National University of Comahue in Argentina. Originally from Colombia, he founded the Black-and-chestnut Eagle Project Colombia in 2008 to collaborate with government and private institutions on conserving this endangered species. His doctoral research from 2017 to 2022 examined the socio-ecological factors influencing human-raptor interactions affecting the Black-and-chestnut Eagle across several South American countries. He has over a decade of experience as a consultant advising raptor conservation projects with NGOs in South America.

Since joining the FitzPatrick Institute in May 2024 as the ABAX Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellow hosted by Associate Professor Arjun Amar, Dr Zuluaga Castañeda has focused on raptor conservation research. His work involves analyzing data on the movement ecology of African raptors to better understand their ecological requirements and support conservation efforts amid the expansion of wind energy in South Africa. This research is conducted in collaboration with Dr Megan Murgatroyd. He has been a member of the IUCN Human-Wildlife Conflict & Coexistence Specialist Group since 2022. His peer-reviewed publications include articles in Scientific Reports (2024), Ornithological Applications (2023), Tropical Conservation Science (2023), and Global Ecology and Conservation (2022), addressing topics such as human-wildlife conflict impacts on avian predators, Neotropical ornithology, and the ecology of the Black-and-chestnut Eagle.

Professional Email: null