Jean-Benoit Charrassin

Jean-Benoit is a senior lecturer with the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France. He is a marine mammals and seabird biologist, whose research is mainly concerned with foraging ecology, behaviour, and oceanography. Since 2002, Jean-Benoit’s work has focussed on the foraging ecology of marine mammals according to oceanographic conditions using telemetry.

This will be Jean-Benoit’s sixth trip south, having spent 5 field seasons in the sub-Antarctic and the Antarctic, during which time he worked with elephant and Weddell seals. He is also a member of the International Whaling Committee Scientific Committee and has recently started a whale research programme in Antarctica, looking at the distribution and abundance of cetaceans off Adélie Land. He is also involved with Southern Ocean Research Partnership.

Jean-Benoit will help out on the small research vessels on the Antarctic Whale Expedition. He will assist with photo-identification, biopsy sampling, data collection and faeces sample collection.