Eighteen years ago, a young woman joined the third parataxonomists training course being taught at the Santa Rosa National Park and other conservation areas. Together, with a dozen other young locals, Socorro Ávila began a stellar career, learning to collect, curate and identify mollusks and later aquatic insects. For the last few months, she has joined a research group at La Selva, led by Station Director Carlos de la Rosa, learning the taxonomy and ecology of a special group of aquatic insects: the non-biting midges of the family Chironomidae. "I think I found my new love!" she recently said to de la Rosa. With an estimated 1,000+ species in the country, of which less than 70 have been described taxonomically, Socorro has a long relationship ahead of her. In the 1 1/2 months she has worked with these insects at La Selva, she has already found 5 or 6 new species and has learned the ins and outs of collecting, sorting, mounting and identified this complex but ecologically important family.

Welcome Socorro! 

A research proposal, submitted by several members the OTS Costa Rican Institutional Committee (CRIC) and  professors from other universities, was recently awarded funding from the National Provosts Council (CONARE) to conduct research at the Palo Verde Biological Station in 2015-2016.

Th e region surrounding Palo Verde is  an ideal location to study global change and greenhouse gas emissions since its vegetation is particularly vulnerable to climate change. The dry tropical forest plays a fundamental role in global greenhouse gas emissions, and the researchers want to understand what factors are contributing to the emission of atmospheric gases in the dry forest and its interrelation with ecosystem integrity.

"We are interested in analyzing functional traits to identify which species, or combination, might emerge as possibly benefited or negatively affected by climate change", declared Braulio Vilchez (TEC) and CRIC's coordinator, who is one of the participating researchers with CRIC members Roberto Cordero (UNA) and Joaquín Sánchez (National Museum), in collaboration with Andrea Vincent (UCR), Cristina Chinchilla (UCR), Gabriela Perez (UCR), and Jennifer Powers (U. of Minnesota). According to Braulio, CRIC also hopes to inspire other delegates to support OTS stations.

OTS congratulates the initiative of these university professors to encourage their colleagues to build interdisciplinary and inter-institutional research teams and take advantage of OTS field station facilities and services to develop their projects. We look forward to your results!

This fundamental OTS field course has trained tropical biologists since the 1960s. At its heart lie the highly regarded OTS "field problems." Students will take away advanced skills in research design, data analysis, writing, science communication, modeling, and collaborative research - all in the breath-taking tropical setting that is Costa Rica. Long days and late nights, filled with science.

The newest Regional University of the Amazon, IKIAM, is starting its academic programs with a bang. A selected group of international advisors, which included professors from, Harvard University, Stanford University, Imperial College of London, Columbia University, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Ecuador, University of California Berkeley, McGill University and our own OTS (represented by Carlos de la Rosa) spent 4 days in the Amazonian city of Tena fine-tuning a revolutionary curriculum with the faculty and administrators of the university. IKIAM, a project of the Coordinating Ministry of Knowledge and Human Talent, was created by presidential decree on December 2013 and will begin their academic programs in October 2014, becoming the first public university in this important Amazonian region. Embedded within the boundaries of a 93,000 hectares rainforest preserve, the university promises to develop a new generation of professionals knowledgeable and trained to deal with the many challenges the Ecuadorian Amazon faces now and will face in the future.