Evolutionary Genetics - EG
Subgroup Leader of Wildlife Genetics

Carlos Alberto Rodríguez Fernandes

Researcher

Phylogeography Molecular Systematics Conservation Genetics Landscape Genetics

I received a Ph.D. in Biology (Phylogeography and Molecular Systematics) from the University of Cardiff (Wales, UK) in 2005 and I am currently a researcher in wildlife genetics in the Evolutionary Genetics group of cE3c and an invited Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Psychology of the University of Lisbon.

Working on wildlife genetics means that my research activities and interests include phylogeography, population genetics, molecular systematics and landscape genetics towards the conservation and management of wildlife.

Examples of topics of recent and ongoing research are:

i) phylogeography and evolutionary history of Palearctic fauna

ii) development of molecular markers for non-invasive and population genetic investigations of mammalian carnivores

iii) studying hybridization in a conservation genetics context

iv) definition of evolutionary significant units in threatened species

v) analyses of natural and human-mediated colonisations and range expansions within the framework of, respectively, conservation status assessments and projects on biological invasions

vi) landscape genetics to evaluate wildlife population connectivity across anthropogenic barriers and between protected areas

International collaborations include Tom Gilbert (University of Copenhagen), Hannah Mumby (University of Hong Kong), Antoinette Kotze (National Zoological Gardens of South Africa), Louiza Derouiche (University of Science and Technology Houari Boumedienne, Algeria), Pamela Burger (University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna), Mafalda Costa (Cardiff University), Frank Hailer (Cardiff University), Szilvia Kusza (University of Debrecen), Juha Merilä (University of Helsinki), Mats Björklund (Uppsala University), Shomita Mukherjee (SACON, India), and Boudjéma Samraoui (Badji Mokhtar Annaba University, Algeria).

I am currently co-supervisor of one PhD student of the BIODIV doctoral program at the cE3c (Teresa Santos), and a FCT PhD student based at the University of Copenhagen (Nuno Martins). Teresa's thesis is concerned with population and conservation genomics of southern African elephants, expanding on her MSc thesis on the population genetics of elephants in private nature reserves in the Greater Kruger National Park. Nuno's thesis aims to investigate the evolutionary history of African golden wolves and Eurasian golden jackals using population genomics.