Ana Villegas, Ph.D.
Senior Program Officer
Ana Cristina Villegas is a senior program officer for the Andes-Amazon Initiative.
Ana grew up in Medellin, Colombia, and attended the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Missouri - St, Louis.
Ana’s research has included the eco-physiological response of plants to changes in rainfall and atmospheric concentrations of CO2, plant population demography, and the influence of animal-plant interactions on forest regeneration. For four years she was an adjunct faculty with Duke University working with undergraduate education programs with the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS) in Costa Rica.
Ana also was a diplomacy fellow with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) working at the US Department of State in the Office of Ecology and Terrestrial Conservation on US policy impacting biodiversity, conservation, and forest issues, particularly in the context of international conventions (e.g. Convention on Biological Diversity, World Intellectual Property Organization and Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species).