Evon Hekkala

Perhaps it started as an undergraduate, spending spare time relabeling century old pygmy elephant spears in the Redpath Museum in Montreal. Ever since, Dr. Hekkala spends most of her time searching for the archived genetic messages found in the tissues of old dead things... especially crocodiles.

Evon leads the Conservation Genetics Laboratory at Fordham where she pursues research at the intersection of behavioral ecology, evolutionary biology, and conservation policy. This work incorporates genetic data from museum specimens, historical records, and archaeological sources into models that elucidate how changes in human management of landscapes have been tracked by species.