Leslie Christidis (born 30 May 1959), also simply known as Les Christidis, is an Australian

ornithologist Ornithology, from Ancient Greek ὄρνις (''órnis''), meaning "bird", and -logy from λόγος (''lógos''), meaning "study", is a branch of zoology dedicated to the study of birds. Several aspects of ornithology differ from related discip ...

. His main research field is the evolution and systematics of birds. He has been director of

Southern Cross University Southern Cross University (SCU) is an Australian public university, with campuses at Lismore and Coffs Harbour in northern New South Wales, and at Coolangatta, the most southern suburb of the Gold Coast in Queensland. In 2019, it was ranke ...

National Marine Science Centre since 2009. He was assistant director at Sydney's

Australian Museum The Australian Museum, originally known as the Colonial Museum or Sydney Museum. is a heritage-listed museum at 1 William Street, Sydney, William Street, Sydney central business district, Sydney CBD, New South Wales. It is the oldest natural ...

from 2004 to 2009. Leslie Christidis graduated as

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

at the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne (colloquially known as Melbourne University) is a public university, public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in the state ...

in 1980. In 1985, he earned his Ph.D. at the

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public university, public research university and member of the Group of Eight (Australian universities), Group of Eight, located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton, A ...

, where he studied the evolutionary genetics of Australian finches. During his research studies, he first worked as a

CSIRO The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency that is responsible for scientific research and its commercial and industrial applications. CSIRO works with leading organisations arou ...

post-doctoral fellow and then as the recipient of Queen Elizabeth II fellowship, he demonstrated that 4,500 species of the world's songbirds had their origin in Australia. Les Christidis was Senior Curator of Ornithology at the

Museum Victoria Museums Victoria is an organisation that includes a number of museums and related bodies in Melbourne. These include Melbourne Museum, Immigration Museum, Scienceworks (Melbourne), Scienceworks, IMAX Melbourne, a research institute, the UNESCO W ...

from 1987 to 1996. Les Christidis is the author or co-author of over 100 scientific papers and books on the taxonomy and evolutionary genetics of birds, bats, marsupials, bryozoans and more recently on cultural intangible heritage. Together with Walter E. Boles he published ''The Taxonomy and Species of Birds of Australia and Its Territories'', with several revisions on Australasian birds including the family

Acanthizidae Acanthizidae—sometimes called Australian warblers—are a family of passerine birds which includes gerygones, thornbills '' Acanthiza'', and scrubwrens '' Sericornis''. The family Acanthizidae consists of small to medium passerine birds, with ...

. Together with

Richard Schodde Richard Schodde, Order of Australia, OAM (born 23 September 1936) is an Australian botany, botanist and ornithology, ornithologist. Schodde studied at the University of Adelaide, where he received a Bachelor of Science, BSc (Hons) in 1960 and a ...

he described ''Amytornis barbatus diamantina'', a subspecies of the

grey grasswren The grey grasswren (''Amytornis barbatus'') is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is found on arid inland floodplains of Australia where it is endemic. The grey grasswren is a rarely seen elusive bird that was first ...

, in 1987. He further described two subfamilies, Amalocichlinae and Pachycephalopsinae, and a genus, '' Cryptomicroeca'' in 2012.Christidis, L.; Irestedt, M.; Rowe, D.; Boles, W. E.; Norman, J. A.: ''Circumscription, diagnosis and description of two subfamilies and one genus of Australo-Papuan robins (Aves: Passeriformes: Petroicidae)''.

Zootaxa ''Zootaxa'' is a peer-reviewed scientific mega journal for animal taxonomists. It is published by Magnolia Press (Auckland, New Zealand). The journal was established by Zhi-Qiang Zhang in 2001 and new issues are published multiple times a week ...

3560: 87–88 He was awarded the W. Roy Wheeler Medallion in 2005.

Selected works

*Les Christidis, Walter Boles: ''The Taxonomy and Species of Birds of Australia and Its Territories''. ''Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union'', 1994. *Les Christidis, Walter Boles: ''Systematics and Taxonomy of Australian Birds''. CSIRO Publishing. 2008.

References

External links

Australian Bird List
(compiled on basis of ''The Taxonomy and Species of Birds of Australia and its Territories'' by Boles/Christidis (1994)) 1959 births Australian ornithologists Australian curators University of Melbourne alumni Australian National University alumni Living people {{Australia-scientist-stub