Ashwin Sivakumar
Ashwin Sivakumar
Ashwin Sivakumar is an avid lifelong birder and naturalist, whose explorations of the natural landscapes around his hometowns of Portland, Oregon and Pasadena, California instilled in him a deep interest in the lives of wild animals. He is intrigued by the process of adaptation, the focus of his research, and hopes to use the tools of genetics to better understand both how the staggering diversity of morphologies and behaviors in nature came about and to understand what determines organisms’ abilities to adapt to rapid anthropogenic change. Passionate about science-based conservation, Ashwin serves on the advisory board of the Pasadena Audubon Society, and has advocated for the use of native plants both in city and private landscaping. He is obsessed with natural history museums, serving on the Harvard Museums of Science and Culture’s advisory board, where he organizes collections tours for undergraduates and helps with social media, outreach, and event planning for the museums; one day, he would like to play a curatorial role in a museum. Deeply interested in American and British folk and roots music, he is an active radio DJ and the outgoing President of Harvard’s student-run radio station, WHRB; he also plays trumpet in Harvard’s Jazz Combo initiative.