Current positions: Since 2022, I have been a Full Professor at the Center for Research and Innovation for Climate Change (CiiCC), School of Sciences, Santo Tomas University, Chile. I teach at the PhD in Conservation and Biodiversity Management. My lab is located at the Centro de Innovación Colaborativa, Ruta T-25 Km 1, Máfil, Chile.
Since 2022, I am a Guest researcher at the Amsterdam Institute for Life and Environment, section Ecology & Evolution, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Check my keynote talk at the 4th Global Soil Biodiversity Conference in Victoria, Canada – April, 2026.


Past positions: I did a Postdoc at the Department of Mycorrhizal Symbioses, Institute of Botany, Czech Academy of Sciences (2021). I was affiliated as a Researcher at the Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability- CAPES, Chile (2018-2021), and did another Postdoc at the University of O’Higgins (Chile) & the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile (2018-2020). I was an ad honorem Professor of “Soil, Ecosystems, and Global Change” at the Open University of Recoleta (Chile, 2019).

Education: I am an Environmental Biologist (2013) from the Jorge Tadeo Lozano University in Colombia, a Doctor in Sciences mention Ecology and Evolution (2018) from the Austral University of Chile, and I have a Diplomat in Philosophy of Biology at the Institute of Philosophy and Complexity Sciences (Chile, 2020).

Stays & Teaching: I have done nine research stays at the Institute of Soil Science at the University of Hannover, Germany; at the Plant Ecology Laboratory of the University of Tartu, Estonia; at the Biodiversity Division, Lund University, Sweden; at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Oviedo, Spain; and at the School of Earth and Sustainability, Northern Arizona University, United States. I have taught or assisted in teaching several courses in Brazil, Colombia, Germany, Chile, Uruguay, Argentina, Panama, Spain, Peru, United States, and Canada.

Society work:
– Founder & coordinator of the South American Mycorrhizal Research Network.
– Vice-Chair of UN FAO’s International Network on Soil Biodiversity (NETSOB) (2025-2027).
– Deputy-Chair of UN FAO’s Intergovernmental Technical Panel on Soils (ITPS) (2025-2028).
– Director, Board of Directors of the International Mycorrhiza Society (2022-2026).
– Network laboratory of the Soil Biodiversity Observation Network (SoilBON).
– Science Associate of the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks (SPUN).
– Member, Global Initiative of Sustainable Agriculture and Environment.
– Advocay/Outreach committees, Society for Open, Reliable, & Transparent Ecology & Evolutionary Biology-SORTEE (2025-present).
– Member of the Evaluation Group Biology 1, National Research and Development Agency (ANID), Chile (2024-present).
–> I belong to the Alerce Costero Corporation (Board of Directors).
–> I am the Scientific Adviser of FungiFest.

Editorial work:
– Associate Editor on: npj Soil Ecology, Frontiers in Microbiology, Frontiers in Plant Science, and Annals of Botany.
– Senior Editor: Journal of Sustainable Agriculture and Environment.
– Editorial Advisor: Plants, People, Planet.
– Editorial Board: Fungal Ecology, IMA Fungus, Rhizosphere and FEMS Microbiolog Reviews.
– Editor-in-Chief, International Mycorrhiza Society Newsletter (2020-2025).

Awards:
– 2025: my Johnson & Marín (2025) ISME J article was voted as Top 1 Mycorrhizal Research Paper in the IMS Newsletter No. 17.
– 2025: Commitment to Internationalization award 2024 from Universidad Santo Tomás, Chile.
– 2025: inducted into the Frontier Science Program (2025-2027), Chilean Academy of Sciences (also part of the Directive).
– 2024: “Carlos Luis Spegazzini Medal” from the International Mycological Association (IMA).
– 2022: “We are Mycelium 2022” award from FungiFest – Valdivia Mushroom Festival.
– 2021: Dr. Humberto Maturana Youth Symposium award from the Chilean Biology Society.
– 2019: Afrocolombian of the Year, category Academy, by El Espectador newspaper and Color de Colombia Foundation. Here is my acceptance speech.

Research: (i) Soil Ecology, studying: Fungal Biodiversity; Fungal Biodiversity in Chile; Mycorrhizal Applications; Soil Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning; Soil Fire Ecology; Soil Chemistry; Root Ecology; South American Mycorrhizas. (ii) Multilevel selection in all sorts of systems, albeit I focus in plant holobiont-symbiont systems. (iii) A myriad of issues related to: Crops vs. Weeds Dynamics; Agricultural Economy; Complexity Science; Philosophy of Biology; Plant Propagation; Science History; Science Sociology.


Download my CV in English and my CV in Spanish. 

Check my profiles on:
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