Written by Laure Poncet
Denisse’s pathway to climate science is unique. Growing up in Ecuador in a family of hoteliers, Denisse first completed an associate degree in tourism and hotel management at the University of Espiritu Santo in Guayaquil.
“I first studied hotel management, because my family had a few hotels back home and the idea was to take over. But I never did in the end,” she said.
During her degree, Denisse undertook a one year exchange at Griffith University in Queensland, Australia. She explained that this experience played a pivotal role in her decision to move to Australia permanently.
“I fell in love with Australia and its lifestyle, so I decided to move over here to start my career.”
“I started working in hotels because hotel management was my major at university, but I quickly realised that I didn’t really like it so I decided to get back to studies.”
“I chose to study marine science, because I’ve been obsessed with sharks since I was a kid. I also wanted to learn more about the protection of marine ecosystems.”
Denisse explained that while she was excited for a fresh start she also knew that it meant beginning everything from scratch. She completed a Bachelor of Marine Science and Zoology and a Master of Marine Biology and GIS at the University of Western Australia.
Denisse quickly became passionate about the conservation of marine ecosystems. As part of her master’s thesis project, she had the opportunity to go to the Galápagos Islands where she studied fish community composition in mangrove ecosystems. Her involvement in this project was made possible by a thesis scholarship from the Charles Darwin Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to the conservation and scientific research of the Galápagos Islands.
“The Galápagos is an amazing place. The landscapes are breathtaking and the marine life is unique. I had such a great time doing research there,” she said.
After a brief return to Australia, where she worked as an environmental consultant, Denisse’s fascination with the Galápagos Islands led her to return a couple of years later, this time to work with her favorite animals – sharks.
“I came back and worked as a marine ecologist for the foundation. We were tagging sharks to find out the areas they occupy and their migratory routes. We then provided this information to the managers of the marine reserve.”
“I saw walls of hammerhead sharks circling around these tiny islands, it was quite a unique experience.”
Besides her research around sharks, Denisse got involved in outreach campaigns directed at both adults and children to promote the importance of the ocean and its protection.
“We had a lot of schools, scientists and university students coming to the foundation. I wanted to practice and be able to share what I was doing with everyone from kids to experts,” she explained.
As an avid programmer, Denisse also got involved with the Ecuadorian Society for Statistics and the R-Ladies, a global organisation that promotes diversity and inclusion in the R computer programming community. She organised and delivered free workshops aimed at making programming and statistics more accessible to the general public.
“During my time in the Galápagos, I noticed there was limited access to good educational resources in Spanish. Scientists were struggling to find good programming workshops or high-quality material.”
“My goal with these workshops was to lower the barriers of entry for people, whether those barriers were geographic, linguistic, or technical. I wanted to make sure more people could access what they needed.”
After her time in the Galápagos, Denisse came back to Australia to start her PhD at the University of Tasmania. She is currently focusing on understanding how changes in fine-scale sea ice and ocean dynamics around Antarctica will impact marine ecosystems in the Southern Ocean.
“For one of my chapters, we are trying to estimate the distribution of crabeater seals using species distribution models. We match the positions of species to the conditions of the ice and the ocean and we try to determine the conditions that the species like and those they avoid. This gives us an idea of the area they potentially occupy,” she said.
Besides her PhD, Denisse works part-time for the Fisheries and Marine Ecosystem Model Intercomparison Project (FishMIP), an initiative that brings together diverse marine ecosystem models to help better understand and project the long-term impacts of climate change on fisheries and marine ecosystems.
Looking ahead, Denisse would like to be involved in field work and conservation projects around sharks.
“I’d love to work with sharks again. I’d be interested in projects that involve field work, modelling and data analysis. I love collecting data in the field, it’s something I really miss.”