Martha Maria Velez

I am a biologist, graduated from the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, Colombia. I studied the density and distribution of the two toed sloth “Choloepus hoffmanni” in a Andean forest of Colombia as an undergraduate research thesis. In 2012, I graduated from San Francisco State University with a Masters degree in Biology, Conservation Biology. For my graduate thesis I studied the identification of an accurate technique to detect the OtHV-1 in California sea lions “Zalophus californianus”. I have been working at the California Academy of Sciences since 2018 as a Curatorial Assistant in the Ornithology and Mammalogy department. My duties are preparing study skins of birds and terrestrial mammals specimens, cataloging and archiving specimens, processing loan requests and volunteer’s supervisor. My other duties include general collection care, hazardous material monitor and field collection assistant.