CV
Here’s a link to a PDF version of my CV (last updated March 2026): Krishna’s CV
Education
- PhD student in Ecology, Institut des Sciences de l’Evolution de Montpellier, Université de Montpellier, France: 2025-2028
- Quantifying the effects of projected abrupt climate changes on biodiversity
- Supervisors: Dr. Vasilis Dakos and Dr. Claire Jacquet
- Working on the ClimTip project, a pan-European consortium exploring the impact of climate tipping points on the earth system
- BS-MS Dual Degree in Biology, minor in Mathematics (with Distinction), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune, India: 2019-2024
- 9.1/10 GPA (top 5% of graduating class of 210)
- Masters’ Thesis: Assessing the sensitivity of microbial communities to external perturbations (Supervisor: Prof. Serguei Saavedra, Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Projects and work experience
- October 2025 - present: PhD student, ISEM, Univ. of Montpellier
- Quantifying the effect of projected abrupt climate change on global biodiversity
- My PhD thesis models the multidimensional risks to global ecosystems arising from crossing climate tipping points, as part of the pan-European ClimTip project. Using daily fine-scale projections of climate in different scenarios of warming, including the collapse of the Atlantic Thermohaline Circulation and Amazon Rainforest, I build geospatial and ecological data synthesis pipelines to predict how novel extremes of temperature, precipitation, and extreme events impact future climate vulnerability of 55,000 animal species over the next 100 years.
- Supervisors: Dr. Vasilis Dakos and Dr. Claire Jacquet
- September 2024 - August 2025: Research Engineer, ISEM, Univ. of Montpellier
- Modeling historical climate sensitivites of global biodiversity
- Publication in review. As part of the CLIMTIP project, I constructed multidimensional historical climate limits for 54,000 species worldwide, incorporating information on species range with high-resolution global climate simulations. This constitutes limits of existence for species pertaining to rainfall, temperature, environmental variability, and extreme events (heatwaves, cold-spells, and droughts).
- Supervisors: Dr. Vasilis Dakos and Dr. Claire Jacquet
- June 2023 - May 2024: Masters’ Thesis Student, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Assessing the sensitivity of microbial communities to external perturbations
- Using empirical dynamic modeling and causal inference methods on long-term datasets from the human gut microbiota, my thesis dealt with non-parametric nonlinear prediction of perturbation effects and extent of recovery in large interacting ecosystems.
- Supervisor: Prof. Serguei Saavedra
- January 2023 - May 2023: Undergraduate Researcher, Dept. of Biology, IISER Pune
- Meta-analysis of plant thermotolerance acclimation
- Publication in prep. Meta-analysis of studies assessing the plasticity of thermal maxima in plants under different environmental conditions. By collecting factors and traits that could govern the strength of acclimation response, I aim to use this as a predictor of future climatic risk.
- Supervisor: Prof. Deepak Barua
- May 2020 - December 2022: Undergraduate Researcher, Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science (IISc)
- Harnessing community science data to predict upward range shifts in montane birds
- Published work in 2022. Developing novel tools to detect montane range shifts in bird populations using community science data. Using global hotspots of bird observations, developing novel techniques for detecting extent of range shifts and therefore risk of habitat loss in the future.
- Supervisor: Prof. Umesh Srinivasan
- May 2020 - December 2022: Undergraduate Researcher, Dept. of Data Science, IISER Pune
- Characterizing Intron Splicing Sites Using Unsupervised Clustering
- Using unsupervised machine learning clustering algorithms and genome data, investigated nucleotides determining intron splicing sites in the fruit fly genome. Different architectures and their associated functional roles were identified.
- Supervisor: Prof. Leelavati Narlikar
Other Projects
- Summer 2022: Summer Intern, Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University
- Spatial Models of Higher-Order Interactions
- Using analytical formulations from statistical mechanics and numerical computer simulations, worked on how spatial structure in ecosystems may mediate the effects of higher-order interactions on species coexistence.
- Supervisor: Prof. Jonathan Levine
- Summer 2021: Summer Intern, Dept. of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago
- Modeling Sign-feasibility in Random Ecosystems
- Applying theorems from combinatorial matrix theory, aimed to look at sign-feasibility, that is, when coexistence of species in ecosystems may occur independent of species interaction strength, depending only on sign of interaction.
- Supervisor: Prof. Stefano Allesina
Skills
- R Programming, including tidyverse and RMarkdown
- Non-linear Dynamics
- Ecological Systems
- Statistical Analysis and GLMs
- Causal Inference
- Climate data handling, especially with cdo and terra
- Extreme Value Theory
- High-dimensional Data Analytics
- QGIS
- Genomics and bioinformatic algorithms
- Machine learning: forecasting and clustering
- Stochastic simulations
- Evolution
- Markov Models
- Probability Theory
- Bayesian Statistics
- Graph theory
Publications
Girish, K. S., & Srinivasan, U. (2022). Community science data provide evidence for upward elevational range shifts by Eastern Himalayan birds. Biotropica, 54(6), 1457-1465.
Talks
April 08, 2025
ClimTip General Assembly 2025 at Institut Henri Poincaré, Paris, Paris, France
March 22, 2024
Poster at MIT Microbiome Symposium, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts
February 26, 2024
Lightning Talk: MIT CEE Research Day at Civil and Environmental Engineering Research Day, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts
October 10, 2020
Poster at Student Conference on Conservation Science (SCCS), Bengaluru, 2020, Bangalore, India/Online
September 28, 2020
Short Talk at Cit-Sci India Conference, Bangalore, India/Online
Service and leadership
- Quizzing
- Founding Member of the Université de Montpellier Quizbowl Team (2026)
- Head Writer, Zephyr Quiz League (2023-2026): writing team for a weekly quiz league of 300+ worldwide participants.
- Coordinator of IISER Pune Quiz Club (2020-2021)
- Music
- Trained classical violinist and Indian classical vocalist
- Coordinator of Aroha, IISER Pune Music Club (2021-2022)
- Nature and Environment
- UNLEASH Global Innovation Lab (2022): Selected as one of the top 1000 Global Talents, to innovate novel solutions to UN Sustainable Development Goals
- Host of a long-running series of nature walks across my hometown in India to raise awareness on conservation and birdlife
- Writing & Communication
- Head of National Publicity & Data Analytics; Mimamsa, IISER Pune’s National Science Challenge (2021)
- Head of Contributions: Kalpa, IISER Pune media house (2020-2021)
- Head of Content Writing: Karavaan, IISER Pune’s annual festival (2020)
- Host and MC, TEDxIISERPune (2019)
- Published a book of my poetry: Important Matters and Other Poems (2017)
