CV
Profile
Marine climate-change ecologist and conservation scientist working on biodiversity redistribution, climate velocity, species distribution modelling, spatial ecology, and applied marine conservation.
My work connects global environmental datasets, ecological theory, reproducible workflows, and conservation decision-making, with a focus on how ocean warming reshapes biodiversity patterns and what that means for protected areas, climate adaptation, and ocean governance.
Current Roles
Senior Associate Scientist, Conservation International
July 2024 - Present
Research Associate, UC Santa Barbara Marine Science Institute
November 2024 - Present
Previous Roles
Associate Research Scientist, Conservation International
November 2021 - June 2024
Affiliated Researcher, UC Santa Barbara Marine Science Institute
January 2022 - October 2024
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The University of Queensland
February 2021 - September 2021
Project Manager, Centro de Ecologia Aplicada
2010 - 2016
Lecturer in Experimental Design, Universidad Católica de la Santísima Concepción
2008 - 2009
Education
PhD in Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland
Climate Change and Conservation, 2021
BSc in Marine Biology, Universidad Católica de la Santísima Concepción
First Class Honours, 2008
Research Strengths
- Marine climate-change ecology and biodiversity redistribution.
- Climate velocity, climate exposure, marine climate refugia, and climate-smart conservation.
- Species distribution modelling, spatial ecology, oceanographic fronts, and marine megafauna.
- Conservation planning, marine protected areas, high-seas conservation, and policy-relevant science.
- Reproducible data science in R, spatial analysis, gridded climate products, Shiny, Git/GitHub, and Quarto.
Grants, Fellowships, and Awards
Save the Blue Five - IKI Project
International Climate Initiative, BMUV/Germany, 2023 - Present. Co-lead on climate-change vulnerability and conservation planning for highly migratory megafauna.
Belmont Forum / Ocean Front Change Project
International project on climate and dynamic ocean features, 2021 - 2024.
Competitive PhD scholarship
Doctoral funding support for PhD studies.
Academic Excellence
Science Faculty, Universidad Católica de la Santísima Concepción, 2008.
Teaching, Training, and Mentoring
Teaching and supervision interests include quantitative ecology, marine conservation, climate-change biology, R, spatial modelling, biodiversity data science, climate-model products, and reproducible research.
Instructor, UCSB ESM240 Climate Change Biology
2023 and 2025. Designed and delivered graduate-level lectures, developed assignments, supervised projects, and evaluated coursework.
Teaching Assistant, University of Queensland
2018 - 2020. Courses included Advanced Analysis of Scientific Data, Analysis of Scientific Data, Pharmacy Data Analysis and Professional Practice, Probability and Statistics in Engineering, Environmental Data Analysis, and Biostatistics and Experimental Design.
Workshop organizer and contributor
Climate and Ocean Modeling Workshop at CERFACS, Climate Change and Marine Megafauna Workshop in Panama, Ocean Front Megafauna and Climate Change workshop at Acadia University, and Ocean Front and Climate Change workshop at Nelson Mandela University.
Mentoring
Mentored graduate students and collaborators on Save the Blue Five climate-change assessment, megafauna-fisheries interactions, climate-smart closures for pelagic fisheries, high-seas conservation, and climate-proof marine protected areas.
Selected public teaching materials are available on the Projects page, including climate-change biology practicals, ocean-front and marine-megafauna workshop material, climate-model tutorials in R, and Climate Data Operators training notes.
Presentations and Service
Invited presentations include climate change in the ocean and conservation at Encuentro del Pacífico Sudeste in Panama, and climate velocity in the ocean and implications for conservation at ASLO. Conference contributions include IMPAC5, Species on the Move, Ocean Sciences Meeting, and the Sustainability, Research and Innovation Congress.
Selected Outputs
- First-author publications in Nature Climate Change and Trends in Ecology & Evolution on climate velocity, deep-ocean biodiversity exposure, and climate-smart protected areas.
- Applied conservation-science contributions in Nature, Nature Reviews Biodiversity, Ecological Applications, and Methods in Ecology and Evolution.
- Interactive Shiny tools for ocean-climate downscaling products and marine megafauna occurrence data.
- Reproducible training and workshop material for students, collaborators, and conservation practitioners.
Languages
Fluent Spanish and fluent English.