Bio

Background

I am a UKRI Future Leader Fellow and Lecturer in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol and leader of the TropEco Lab.

TropEco Lab's current research adopts [i] social sciences frameworks to co-produce knowledge and inform conservation efforts in Amazonia (Voices of Amazonia, SynPAm & CO-SPACE workshop); [ii] research synthesis of previously collected biodiversity data to promote sustainable practices and policy (INCT-SynBiAm, Scaling up TAOCA); & [iii] ecological fieldwork to understand the drivers and consequences of changes in biodiversity.

How did I get here? I did Biological Sciences (2010) followed by an MRes in Applied Ecology (2011) – both at the Federal University of Lavras (UFLA; Brazil). I was part of a dual PhD programme between UFLA and Lancaster University (LU; UK), and gained my PhD in Applied Ecology (UFLA) and Sciences of Tropical Environments (LU) in 2015, looking at the impacts of selective logging on insects and associated ecological processes within Brazilian Amazon forests.

I followed that up with a NERC-funded PDRA (2016-2018) at LU, looking at the impacts of the 2015-16 El Niño drought and associated fires on human-modified Amazonian forests. After two years in the UK, I returned to the warm tropical weather, as a post-doctoral fellow (2018-2020), working at the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA - Amazônia Oriental) in Belém, Brazil. Following that, I was a Senior Research Associate (2020-2021) at LU, funded by the BNP Paribas Foundation through the BioClimate project, with an Academic Visitor status at the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Canterbury.