Team

CURRENT MEMBERS

Naiara Rodríguez-Ezpeleta

Senior Researcher

Naiara joined AZTI in 2011 as senior researcher where she develops projects related to the application of genetic technologies to improve marine management. She did her PhD in Montreal (Canadá) and a postdoc in Newcastle (UK) on deep eukaryotic phylogeny and worked as research scientists in CIC bioGUNE (Spain).

Email: nrodriguez[at]azti.es

Iñaki Mendibil

Laboratory Technician

Iñaki joined AZTI in 2012 as laboratory technician. He is in charge of managing the laboratory, including sample inventory, protocol development and execution as well as student laboratory work supervision. He has wide experience in high-throughput sequencing library preparation for a variety of applications.

Email: imendibil[at]azti.es

Natalia Díaz-Arce

Researcher

Natalia joined AZTI in 2015 to do a PhD on population genomics of Atlantic Bluefin tuna; now, she is involved in the population genetics related projects of the team, focusing on deciphering the genetic connectivity and demography of several commercial fish species, including their potential adaptation ot pressures such as fishing or climate change.

Email: ndiaz[at]azti.es

Iker Pereda-Agirre

PhD student

Iker joined AZTI in 2019 to do his PhD on the application of the close kin mark recapture (CKMR) method to commercial fish species and developing frameworks to integrate genetic knowledge into the fisheries management process.

Email: ipereda[at]azti.es

Cristina Claver de Palacio

PhD student

Cristina joined AZTI in 2020 to do her MSc thesis project as part of the IMBRsea program and in 2021 started a PhD on the application of eDNA based analyses to explore the deep ocean as part of the SUMMER project.

Email: cclaver[at]azti.es

Oriol Canals

Researcher

Oriol joined AZTI March 2020 as postdoctoral researcher associated to the EDAMAME project; now, he is in charge of overseeing the environmental/community DNA related projects of the team. He obtained his PhD from the University of Barcelona, studying protist as bioindicators , and did a postdoctoral stay at the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM-CSIC) studying marine ciliate global distribution and seasonality.

Email: ocanals[at]azti.es

Natalia Gutierrez

Laboratory Technician

Natalia joined the team in September 2021, although she has been working in AZTI since 1998. She is in charge of performing molecular analyses, including DNA extraction, library preparation, etc. She has also wide experience with sample biobanking and is helping the team on that aspect too.

Email: ngutierrez[at]azti.es

Alice Manuzzi

Postdoctoral Researcher

Alice joined AZTI in 2022 to work on the GIFAMAN project. She obtained her PhD from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU Aqua) working on the population genomics of contemporary and historical specimens of tiger shark. Her core interests are marine conservation and the application of genomic techniques to inform management plans and fisheries policy

Email: amanuzzi[at]azti.es

Mukesh Bhendarkar

PhD Student

Mukesh Bhendarkar joined AZTI in March 2022 for his PhD. Before joining AZTI, he worked as a Scientist at the ICAR-National Institute of Abiotic Stress Management, Pune, India. Now he’s looking at the potential for eDNA approaches to provide insights and foresight into fisheries resource management in a changing climate scenario.

Email: mparasram[at]azti.es

Marina Puebla

PhD Student

Marina joined AZTI in September 2022 to work on her PhD associated to the GIFAMAN project. Before joining AZTI, she did her MSc thesis project on acoustic monitoring as part of the IMBRsea program and worked at IATS-CSIC on fish stress using molecular techniques.

Email: mpuebla[at]azti.es

Leire G. de Amézaga

Trainee Researcher

Leire joined AZTI in September 2022 to expand her research experience after her double degree in Biotechnology and Oceanography and previous research experience at the Universidad Católica de Valencia, AZTI and CCMAR as undergraduate student.

Email: lamezaga[at]azti.es

PAST MEMBERS

Imanol Aguirre-Sarabia, PhD student

Carlos Jurado, Master student

Agostino Leone, Postdoctoral researcher

Natalia Fraija-Fernandez, Postdoctoral researcher

Anaïs Rey, PhD student

Marie Catherine Bouquieaux, MSc student

Eva Aylagas, PhD student

Elsa Cuende, MSc student

Jon Corell, MSc student

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