The EMB Young Ambassador Alumni Programme enables former Ambassadors to retain contact and engagement with EMB, as well as with current Ambassadors and other Alumni, in a more informal setting. Every year, the Alumni elect one member to serve as Alumni Representative and represent them at EMB Plenary meetings, and provide updates on their activities and progress. EMB also continues to provide visibility to the activities of the Alumni, and both EMB and the Alumni can benefit from the ongoing contact.
Where are they now?
EMB Young Ambassadors 2023-2025
After graduating from high school, Alexandra Hahn volunteered for a year in nature conservation at the German Wadden Sea coast. She obtained her BSc from the University of Rostock with a guest semester at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. She completed her Master studies in Biological Oceanography at EMB Member Organisation GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany. Since 2023 she is a PhD candidate in the Marine Evolutionary Ecology group at GEOMAR where she investigates local adaptation to various stressors in Baltic Sea copepods to assess how populations might react to a future changing ocean. She also has a passion for ocean themed art and shares her work on exhibitions and social media. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
Riwan Leroux is a researcher in aquatic ecology with a PostDoc position at the Deep-Sea laboratory (BEEP) at EMB Member IFREMER, France. He works with Marjolaine Matabos and Jozée Sarrazin on evaluating the impact of research activities on hydrothermal vent fields. After a PhD in Canada, where he worked in trophic ecology and specialized in big data analysis, he chose the deep sea to unravel the impact of human activities in these remote areas. His PROTECT project, standing for “impact indicators in a deeP-sea maRine prOtecTed arEa and reCommendations for management”, is at the interplay between research and public policy support to co-construct management strategies. He was also a member of the Deep Sea and Ocean Health working group. You can find him on Google Scholar here.
EMB Young Ambassadors 2022-2024
Juliette Aminian Biquet is a researcher in ecology and conservation sciences, with broad interests for all natural sciences, socio-ecosystems functioning and protection. She has been involved in various projects, notably on the impact of fisheries, evolutionary consequences of climate change, our perception of nature, or population monitoring in several ecosystems. She is involved in scientific mediation about biodiversity. Juliette is now specializing in marine ecology, as a PhD candidate at the Centro de Ciências do Mar, thanks to a scholarship from FCT, a Portuguese EMB Member. She is studying marine protected areas in the European Union, describing the protection they were designed to deliver, and investigating the underlying reasons that led to these levels of protection, from the EU to the national scale, including the influence of individuals in these processes. She hopes her work can help to improve the socio-ecological benefits of the EU spatial protection. She is also a member of the Navigating the Future VI working group. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
Alfredo Santiago Garcia de Vinuesa Gutierrez grew up in Extremadura, Spain, away from the sea. However, he always showed an enormous interest and curiosity in the marine world. Alfredo obtained a BSc in Marine Science in 2010 from the University of Cádiz, and just after, he moved to work in the Barcelona Institute of Marine Science (ICM-CSIC). From there, he completed his studies with an MSc in Biodiversity and a PhD in Marine Science, both granted by the University of Barcelona. During his PhD, Alfredo focused his research toward the study of trawling impacts over especially vulnerable Mediterranean marine ecosystems to improve their management, working very close with stakeholders like fishermen’s, NGOs and policy makers. Since then, Alfredo has been a great defender of participative management. He has now returned to Cádiz, where he is currently a Postdoc at the Spanish Institute of Oceanography (IEO-CSIC) – an EMB Member Organisation - working together with stakeholders, and trying to improve current Guadalquivir Estuary management through participative processes. You can find him on ResearchGate.
EMB Young Ambassadors 2021-2023
Rebecca Zitoun grew up in Germany, where she obtained a BSc in Earth Sciences from the University of Frankfurt and a MSc in Marine Environmental Science from the Carl Ossietzky University Oldenburg before moving to New Zealand where she received a Postgrad Diploma in Marine Science and a PhD in Marine Chemistry from the University of Otago. Her PhD project investigated the principles and processes underlying copper speciation in marine ecosystems around New Zealand in an effort to advance current understanding of trace metal biogeochemistry, refine aquatic biogeochemical models, and improve environmental risk assessments for bioactive metals. From 2020 to 2021 Rebecca worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Royal Netherlands Institute of Sea Research (NIOZ) focusing on the biogeochemistry of iron in the High Latitude North Atlantic. In October 2021, Rebecca became part of the Marine Mineral Resource group of Geomar-Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, an EMB Member Organization in Germany, and in 2023, she moved to Hobart, Tasmania. She is now working with the Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) as a Science Engagement Officer for Coastal Observations and Coordinator of the Coastal Research Infrastructure Initiative (CoastRI). She is also serving as the Executive Officer for the National Marine Science Committee in Australia, and has co-founded a startup called BlueDot Project. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
Anjali Gopakumar holds a BTech in Biotechnology from VIT University, India, and an MSc in the EU-funded Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Programme: International Master of Science in Marine Biological Resources (IMBRSea). She completed her Cotutelle PhD, conducted at University of Bologna (Italy) - an EMB Member Organisation via CoNISMa - and Macquarie University (Australia), investigating the ecosystem functions and services of restored salt marshes in urban seascapes in October 2024. She focused on the impacts of restoration on microbial communities and biogeochemical fluxes in salt marshes in the Venetian lagoon in Italy, and in the estuaries of New South Wales in Australia. She is now working as a postdoc at Macquarie University as part of a large collaborative project investigating the management of certain marine invasive species in Sydney harbour. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
EMB Young Ambassadors 2020-2022
Natalija Dunić is undertaking a postdoctoral programme at IZOR granted by the Ministry of Science and Education in Croatia, in which her main research is the impact of different climate change scenarios on the Adriatic Sea thermohaline properties, the latter conditioning the life of marine habitants, in particular of those who have low tolerance levels for temperature and salinity changes. She has a MSc in Physics from University of Split, Croatia, and a PhD in Geophysics from the Faculty of Sciences at the University of Zagreb, Croatia. Her PhD research was conducted at EMB Member the Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries in Split (IOF), where she investigated the Adriatic Sea thermohaline circulation using several regional climate models. She is also engaged in a Croatian public outreach project Oceanographers on the Island. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
Alessandro Cresci is currently working on a postdoctoral project at the Institute of Marine Research (IMR), an EMB Member Organization in Norway, focusing on the effects of anthropogenic disturbances on migratory behavior of fish, with special focus on Offshore Wind Farms (OWFs). He was also a member of the EMB working group on Underwater Noise. He has a PhD in Ocean Sciences from the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (RSMAS) at the University of Miami, FL, USA. His PhD project investigated the most mysterious aspects of the migratory behavior of early-life stages of European eels and other species of fish. Specifically, his work focused on the role of the Earth's magnetic field and celestial cues in the orientation of fish. He grew up in the south of Italy, where he obtained his MSc in Marine Biology and his BSc in Biological Sciences from the Federico II University of Naples. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
EMB Young Ambassadors 2019-2021
Alba González Vega completed her PhD in Oceanography and Global Change (ULPGC) in 2024. Her work was developed at the Spanish Institute of Oceanography (IEO), an EMB member. She works on a multidisciplinary study of the submarine volcano Tagoro (Canary Islands, Spain), which erupted in 2011 and still remains active in a degassing stage. Her work assessed the impact of the hydrothermal emissions from this shallow volcano on the physical, chemical and biological properties of the local marine environment. She was also a member of the EMB working group on Marine Geohazards. She is currently working as a researcher at IEO in Tenerife on the VULCANA project. You can find her on Google Scholar here.
Liam Lachs completed his PhD on how climate change affects corals and coral reefs in 2024. Specifically, this work explored the demographics of coral populations, creating predictive models of coral bleaching in partnership with NOAA, and testing the scaling-up potential of assisted evolution as a method of coral reef restoration. This work was a part of the ERC project CORALASSIST at Newcastle University, UK, and was funded by EMB member NERC. He was also a member of the EMB working group on Coastal Resilience. He is currently doing a Postdoc at Newcastle University as part of a collaboration with Palau, Philippines and Australia. They are working to understand the evolutionary potential of thermally-sensitive corals to both predict natural adaptation and explore the potential for assisted evolution interventions, and to understand how adaptive potential depends on the efficacy of local marine coastal management plans. You can find him on Google Scholar here.