Emily Ruiz-Puerta

This PhD project will give us a window to the past on this animal species, which has been affected not only by human disturbances but also by changes on climate conditions. Using archaeological remains, we will build their past history providing us new tools to develop better conservation strategies on their current populations along the Arctic.

This PhD project is part of the ITN-MSCA SeaChanges at the Arctic Centre in coordination with the Groningen Institute of Archeology at the University of Groningen and the Globe Institute from the University of Copenhagen. Her project investigates the impact of hunting on ancient and modern Atlantic walrus populations. For this she is using ancient DNA from different time periods and different Atlantic walrus sub populations along the Arctic. The first stage of her research consists in using mitochondrial ancient DNA (maternal inheritance) to understand the past phylogeny, genetic diversity and structure of these subpopulations. We will like to evaluate, if the current subpopulation structure and distribution were the same in the past or this has changed not only due to hunting but also due to changes on climate conditions. Second, we will evaluate genetic signals of selection due to hunting. For this, more than 100 samples have been collected from different partners institutions and we will start evaluating them mid of this year.

Emily has a Master in Science, Technology, and Health with a specialization in Agrosciences, Environment, Landscape, and Forest from AgroParisTech and the Museum d’histoire naturelle from Paris, France in 2017. She has a bachelor in Sciences Degree program in Biology from the Universidad peruana Cayetano Heredia with further specialization in ecology in 2014. For her bachelor project, she studied the feeding behavior of south American pinnipeds in the south coast of Peru, analyzing the changes in their diet due external impacts as overfishing and climate change. Her master thesis titled in French “Zone tampon patrimoine mondial forêt de Fontainebleau” aims to understand the importance of preservation of the Fontainebleau forest and its castle.