Current role: Director of IFREMER’s – Délégation Océan Indien
Policy researcher at MARECO, associated scientist at the Charles Darwin Foundation, and scientific advisor at the Eagle Ray project- Mexican Caribbean
I am a marine biologist. Everything in the ocean sparks my interest and I often wish I could study many more disciplines. But in 2001, I chose a particular group of marine animals: elasmobranchs.
Thanks to an amazing senior scientist I worked with (Dr. Felipe Galvan) who gave us newbies -undergrad students- the best talk ever about sharks and why we should care about them. Since then, I’ve been studying elasmobranchs (sharks and rays) to improve the conservation and management of their populations. I started my career in La Paz, BCS, México studying sharks and rays from fisheries landings. I then moved to Australia, then to Indonesia, then the Galapagos islands, then Europe… In all these places I studied movement patterns of rays, genetics, abundance of sharks within marine portected areas, and used a few other interesting approaches to produce information. I have also worked with NGOs to develop strategies to monitor elasmobranch populations and to create education & outreach programs to work with the community. As a biologist, I believe the biological sciences are most useful when the research questions are driven by management and/or conservation issues. After working with many stakeholders, I also think that management and conservation programs are more effective when they are multi-disciplinary and involve the community, scientists, and many other stakeholders. I am therefore interested in projects and institutions where the research questions are motivated and guided by management/conservation needs, and where cross-disciplinary science becomes a tool for improving the management of our marine ecosystems in any way.
@TheFloRay in Twitter