Profile of Evan Richardson
Decades of polar bear knowledge

Scientist Evan Richardson “wears many hats”, conducting fieldwork, analyzing data and writing papers, mentoring students and postdocs, providing advice, and engaging northern communities between Hudson Bay, the shores of the Arctic Ocean, and Winnipeg, his home base at Environment and Climate Change Canada. Evan knew from an early age that he would have a career in natural sciences. He followed his passion and curiosity reading every book and magazine on nature that he could find, and today is a respected authority whose work contributes to our understanding of the ecology of polar bears.

Lightening strike sparks prolific career

As a child, Evan’s scientific curiosity was first sparked by the diversity of creatures in the tide pools on the shores of Vancouver Island. This passion expanded to caribou, foxes, owls, and polar bears in 1998, when working as a research assistant in the Arctic. However, the pivotal moment came in 2001, when he met Dr. Ian Stirling, Canada’s most distinguished polar bear scientist offered him a chance to work on polar bears! Evan’s mission was to assess the impact of lightning-caused forest fires on the maternity denning habitats of female polar bears in western Hudson Bay. To this day, he continues to conduct research on the threats facing this species at risk. He adds with a smile, “We joke in the lab that my whole career started with a lightning strike! You never know what will create an opportunity in life.”

In 2004, Evan completed his master’s degree and was hired by Environment and Climate Change Canada as a biologist to lead a large-scale tagging and capture program on two polar bear subpopulations in northern and southern Beaufort Sea. For four springs, Evan patrolled the Arctic ice, collecting samples to assess the health and status of polar bears. The results of his work contributed to the polar bear being added to the list of species protected by the United States’ Endangered Species Act in 2008.

Evan continued his work as a researcher for Environment and Climate Change Canada, while also starting his doctoral studies in 2009. “I spent my evenings and weekends collecting and analyzing genetic data, creating the first estimate of male polar bear reproductive success on the planet,” he explains. “However, I wouldn’t recommend doing a full-time job and a PhD on the weekends!”

Since completing his PhD in 2015, Evan Richardson has worked all over the Canadian Arctic, collaborating with specialists in areas ranging from polar bear health, habitat use, the survival and productivity of subpopulations, as well as assessing genetic relatedness between individuals and subpopulations. He has also forged strong ties with the people from northern Indigenous communities, as their knowledge is essential for polar bear conservation. He considers himself privileged to benefit from the collaboration of so many partners and recognizes his important role to lead the science and inform decision-makers about the species best ways to manage and conserve this iconic.

Technology for new horizons in conservation

Evan explains that one of his challenges is keeping pace with technology, since the tools available to ecologists have evolved significantly over the past 20 years. Evan muses, “If someone had told me at the start of my career that I would one day be working on laboratory-generated polar bear neurons, I wouldn't have believed it!” New genetic tools have allowed Evan and his colleagues to determine, among other things, that these bears have a “genetic age” higher than their actual age—four decades of global warming leading to longer ice-free periods have increased the stress on polar bears. The results of these analyses are currently being reviewed in one of the world’s foremost scientific publications.

Evan is also excited about the potential for another new tool, stem cells, for understanding stresses on polar bears. “We’ve known for a long time that polar bears are exposed to contaminants such as polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE), a class of substances used as flame retardants that can be found in our household furniture, for example, and in the Arctic environment, but we still don't know what their effects are on the bears. Working with researchers from the University of Manitoba, we are attempting to use stem cells to grow various tissues—brain, liver, muscle, heart—to recreate them in the laboratory. With this technique, we can study how these contaminants influence, for example, the neurological development of polar bears and their overall health,” explains Evan with fascination.

What’s even more amazing is that stem cells can be resistant to cryopreservation, a technique used to preserve viable cells at ultra-low temperatures. “There are many interesting applications for this process. In a context where climate change is affecting biodiversity, it would be possible to return to the freezer, take out the preserved samples, and by artificial insemination revitalize the genetic diversity of a population. It’s another tool in our toolbox to contribute to the conservation of the species,” adds Evan.

Can we be optimistic about the future of polar bears?

The polar bear has become an icon of climate change. It fascinates the public, concerns researchers, and is culturally important for Indigenous communities. Are we right to fear for its future? Evan replies, “What motivates me is being able to bring attention to the global climate crisis with our project. The polar bear is an emblem that captures people’s attention, offering us an opportunity to raise awareness of the impacts of climate change. We can no longer ignore climate change: our daily lives are increasingly affected by floods, hurricanes, droughts, and forest fires. It is becoming increasingly clear that this crisis will not only affect biodiversity, but also humanity. In my opinion, this reality will spur people into action. I don’t know what the solution will be—perhaps a drastic reduction in our use of fossil fuels, or the development and application of carbon sequestration technologies—but I think we’re at a turning point where people want change, and that’s what makes me optimistic about the future.”