| Robin B. Foster | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Field: | Ecology |
| Work Institution: | University of Chicago, Field Museum of Natural History |
| Alma Mater: | Dartmouth College, Duke University |
| Thesis Title: | Seasonality of fruit production and seedfall in a tropical forest ecosystem in Panama |
| Thesis1 Url: | and |
| Thesis2 Url: | )--> |
| Thesis Year: | 1973 |
| Doctoral Advisor: | Dwight Billings |
| Doctoral Students: | Phyllis Coley |
Robin B. Foster is a botanist studying tropical forests. He co-originated the "tropical forest dynamics plot".[1]
Foster graduated from Dartmouth College in 1966 with a Bachelor of Science in biology, and attained his Botany / Plant Ecology PhD in 1974 at Duke University under ecologist Dwight Billings.[2] [3] In 1979, while at the University of Chicago, work on Barro Colorado Island with frequent coauthor Stephen P. Hubbell contributed to the development of the first tropical forest dynamics plot, leading to a global network of 18 such parcels.[4] The "audacious" plan was to periodically map and measure every tree within 50ha. As a plant ecologist with Conservation International he participated in studies to inform urgent conservation decisions as part of the first "Rapid Assessment Program".[5] [6] During his extensive fieldwork in Perú, he contracted both malaria and hepatitis.[7] He has taught biology at the University of Chicago and served as a staff biologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. At the Field Museum he founded the Live Photos of Plants project and Rapid Reference Collection.[8] [9] In 2013, Foster was elected an honorary fellow of the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation (ATBC).