Craig Packer, director of the Lion Research Center at the University of Minnesota, will be speaking Monday in the Great Hall of the Memorial Union in his lecture “Lion Conservation on a Crowded Continent.”

Packer is a long-time researcher on lion behavior and human-lion interaction for the well-known Serengeti Lion Project, according to the Lectures program.

The Serengeti Lion Project is the oldest lion research project in Africa that monitors and studies lion populations in inaccessible parts of the ecosystem. The Serengeti Lion Project has been conducting research for the past 46 years, according to the Serengeti Lion Project.

The project has nearly 100 articles of scientific research on lions and their health, habitat and conservation. Some of their research has been featured on BBC and National Geographic, according to the Lion Project.

Packer received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University in 1972. While at Stanford, Packer went to Tanzania to study baboons at the Gombe Stream Research Centre.

Packer started to lead the research for the Serengeti Lion Project in 1978 after completing his doctorate research at the University of Sussex on Japanese macaques in Hakusan National Park, according to the Lion Project.

Packer is the author of “Into Africa,” which won the 1995 John Burroughs medal. He has  and along with more than 100 scientific articles, a majority of which are about lions.

The lecture is cosponsored by Agronomy, the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Miller Lecture Fund, Ecology, Iowa Cooperative Fish & Wildlife Service among other sponsors.