Research team
Expertise
My research expertise bridges evolutionary ecology, biodiversity monitoring, and One Health, focusing on African bats and tropical forest ecosystems. I examine how variation in bat functional traits, including flight behavior, acoustic signals, dispersal capacity, and genetic diversity, reflects ecosystem integrity, shapes species’ responses to environmental change, and influences bat-borne pathogen prevalence. Comparing traits across species and habitats links biodiversity patterns to wildlife pathogen dynamics, revealing the ecological mechanisms that sustain virus persistence. Understanding these processes generates predictive insights into zoonotic spillover and informs strategies for preventing emerging infectious diseases. I integrate extensive field-based monitoring, including bat and mammal bioacoustics, mist-netting, harp trapping, camera trapping, and environmental DNA sampling, with laboratory and computational approaches such as phylogenetics, viral genomics, bioinformatics, and remote sensing. This combination captures fine-scale species assemblage traits alongside broad-scale patterns of community structure and environmental variability. I apply integrative taxonomy and am involved in eco-epidemiological frameworks to determine how habitat disturbance, species interactions, and community composition drive pathogen circulation. Filovirus exposure patterns, for example, reveal multi-host networks shaped by complex pathways and landscape configuration, highlighting ecological factors that amplify or buffer viral persistence. I am involved in developing rapid, low-input, and cost-effective biodiversity assessment strategies across tropical and temperate biomes. Standardized sampling, functional biodiversity indices, and comparative analyses across restoration and land-use gradients generate actionable metrics for ecosystem resilience, vertebrate diversity, and virome complexity. These tools inform conservation planning, ecosystem restoration, disease risk assessment, and evidence-based decision-making, delivering scalable and transferable solutions across regions. Beyond bats, I contribute to broader wildlife conservation and One Health initiatives in tropical landscapes. I study primates, including endangered red colobus and chimpanzee populations, assessing gut microbiota, experimenting with gut-passed seed germination under controlled conditions to support local conservation education, and integrating local ecological knowledge to understand human-wildlife interactions and conservation perception. I contribute to advancing knowledge on onchocerciasis (river blindness) vector foci, a disease that endemically affects human populations across Sub-Saharan Africa, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo. My research emphasizes integrative, scalable approaches that connect ecological theory with applied conservation and human health outcomes. Linking evolutionary ecology, biodiversity monitoring, and virology demonstrates how functional diversity and community dynamics govern pathogen circulation and ecosystem resilience. This work advances predictive frameworks for zoonotic risk, strengthens conservation and restoration strategies, and positions ecological research as a central tool for proactive disease surveillance, sustainable ecosystem management, and policy-relevant solutions. Delivering transferable methods, metrics, and monitoring frameworks enhances global capacity to mitigate emerging infectious disease risks while safeguarding biodiversity and ecosystem function across tropical and temperate landscapes.