Adrian Vega is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Wildlife Conservation and Management, School of Natural Resources. His research focuses on habitat fragmentation in the southern Baja California Peninsula and its possible genetic effects on endemic versus non-endemic vertebrates. The core aim of this research is to determine whether such habitat fragmentation causes greater inbreeding and genetic differentiation along with loss of genetic diversity, particularly in endemic species with low dispersal and small home ranges. This question is of particular importance in a region like the Baja California Peninsular Desert, where endemic species are particularly abundant but are potentially vulnerable to growing habitat fragmentation caused by increasing agriculture, tourism and urban development.
Adrian has received several previous scholarships during his academic career, such as the Telefonos de Mexico (TELMEX) Excellence Scholarship from 1997-2002 and the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology (CONACYT) scholarship for Master in Science Studies from 2000-2002. In addition, his current studies are being supported by a further CONACYT scholarship for Ph.D. studies (2006-2009), and he was awarded the William A Calder III Scholarship by the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona, for the period Nov. 2006-Nov. 2007.
Adrian received his B.S. in Marine Biology from the Universidad Autónoma de Baja California Sur, La Paz, Baja California Sur, Mexico, in June 2000. He received his M.S. in Use, Management and Conservation of Natural Resources with Emphasis on Marine Biology from the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas del Noroeste (CIBNOR), La Paz, Baja California Sur, in December 2002.
Adrian's interest in the endemic species of the Gulf of California and the Baja California Peninsula is longstanding, and he expects it to inform his career well past the completion of his Ph.D. studies. Ultimately, his goal is to return to northwestern Mexico and to continue developing research about patterns of evolution, behavior and genetic architecture of endemic species, with a particular focus on its implications for the conservation of evolutionary processes within the region. |
