Jacobo Reyes - Velasco

I am originally from a small town called Colima, in the west coast of Mexico, well not exactly, I moved around several times during my childhood and finally my parents established in Colima, were I grew up.

I have always been very intrigued by the natural world. During high school I teamed up with my friend Alexander Hermosillo (aka, Barney) and started several projects related to the study and conservation of the freshwater turtles of my home state. This led us to several grants and the building the first freshwater breeding project in the state and a guide to the sustainable use of local freshwater turtles. With time I became more and more interested in other reptiles, as well as amphibians

I started my university at the Universidad de Colima, but later I transferred to the Universidad de Guadalajara, in the neighbor state of Jalisco, were I obtained a BS in biology. Right after that I did an internship with the lab of Dr. Eric Smith from the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA), which consisted of fieldwork in Mexico, museum work and lab work in Arlington.

After college I took a job as an eco-tour guide at Ecotours de Mexico, in the tourist trap town of Puerto Vallarta. I would take people whale watching, kayaking, hiking, snorkeling, turtleing (looking for sea turtles) and all that other boring stuff. 

I worked as an eco-tour guide for a couple of seasons before getting accepted into the PhD program at UTA, under the guidance of Dr. Jonathan Campbell, one of the most renowned herpetologists in the world, and Dr. Todd Castoe, a leading figure in snake genomics. 

Later I did a postdoc at the Boissinot Lab at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD). My research was focused on the phylogeography, systematics, and genomic adaptations in Ethiopian frogs, mostly of the genera Leptopelis and Ptychadena.

After a break during the pandemic, I joined the Meyer Lab at the University of Konstanz, Germany. I spent a year there studying South American fishes of the family Anablepidae, before returning to Mexico.

Apart from evolutionary biology and herpetology, I really enjoy the outdoors: hiking, camping, kayaking, caving, biking.... I also really enjoy photography.