Manjula Tiwari, Ph.D. - President
Manjula is a Conservation Scientist with a focus on sea turtles. Her projects cover a wide range of issues, including nesting beach ecology, the impact of fisheries on sea turtle populations, and developing holistic conservation strategies in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and the Western Pacific.
The local communities in the Turtle Islands of Sierra Leone have named a beach “Manjula Beach” in recognition of her efforts to conserve their sea turtles.
She was affiliated with the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s) Marine Turtle Ecology and Assessment Program in La Jolla, California, for 20 years. She also served as a Scientific and Technical Advisor to international sea turtle projects funded by the US Fish and Wildlife Service for 17 years.
Catalina Reyes, Ph.D. - Secretary
Catalina’s passion for sea turtles began as a Research Assistant (2000) and later Field Coordinator (2001) for the Sea Turtle Conservancy in Tortuguero, Costa Rica. In 2002 she joined the Endangered Wildlife Trust to develop the tagging and conservation program for Leatherback Sea Turtles in Soropta, Panama. Catalina earned a master’s degree in 2006 studying the effects of daily and seasonal cycles in the metabolism and chemosensitivity of freshwater turtles at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
She continued her research in Comparative Physiology at UBC, earning a Doctoral degree in 2013 for studying the role of chemoreceptors in cardiorespiratory control in reptiles. She currently teaches animal and human physiology courses at the University of California, San Diego.
Maga Kisriev - Treasurer
Maga is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) with 9 years of public accounting experience with international accounting firms in the Washington, DC and San Francisco Bay area specializing in taxation of nonprofit organizations. Maga supervises compliance with Federal, State, and Attorney General filings for national and international public charities, private foundations, associations, and welfare organizations. He specializes in consultations on Unrelated Business Income, Intermediate Sanctions, and Corporate Sponsorships among other areas. His former and current clients include The Humane Society of the United States, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Save the Redwoods Foundation among many others.
Maga also worked as a field officer for The International Red Cross distributing aid to refugees during the war in Chechnya.
Rebecca Lent, Ph.D. - Board member
Rebecca has served as Executive Secretary of the International Whaling Commission since January 2018. Prior to that appointment, Rebecca worked with the U.S. government for 25 years, most recently as the Executive Director of the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission, and as the Director of the Office of International Affairs at the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Her positions at NMFS included serving as U.S. Commissioner in two regional tuna management organizations, a one-year secondment at the World Bank, and NMFS Regional Administrator in California. Rebecca is an economist by training and started her career with a post-doc in France, followed by a decade in academia in Québec.
On her personal time, Rebecca serves on the Technical Advisory Board of the Marine Stewardship Council in London and is also a member of Batala London, an Afro-Brazilian percussion band.
Jonathan Shurin, Ph.D. - Board member
Jonathan Shurin is a Professor in the Section of Ecology, Behavior and Evolution at University of California San Diego. His research identifies the factors that underly the structure and functioning of ecosystems and their relation to human well-being. These include climate, the presence of animals, particularly predators, and chemical pollution.
Projects take place in the kelp forests and marine protected areas of the Canadian Pacific coast, mountain lakes of the Sierra Nevada of California, and the Magdalena Medio region of Colombia.
Andrew Solomon - Board member
Andrew has worked in natural history television since 1997, first as commissioning editor at CANAL+’ documentary investment arm, Docstar, then as a freelance consultant and adaptor for producers and distributors including ZDF Enterprises.
From 2011 to 2020 Andrew was Head of Natural History at ORF in Vienna, responsible for the prime-time weekly UNIVERSUM slot, and for UNIVERSUM’s blue chip wildlife production and coproduction slate.
John Dutton - Board member
John is a freelance filmmaker: As cameraman, director, producer, writer and editor, his projects take him from the red carpets of Hollywood to the beaches of remote islands. Fascinated by the field of science and conservation, he has produced award-winning nature and wildlife documentaries, “Discover Wonder: The Octopus Garden,” “Jurassic Journey,” “The Pacific Leatherback,” “Turtles: An Uncertain Future,” as well as feature documentaries “Hudon River Wild,” and “The Canary Islands,” for Smithsonian Television, and International European Broadcasters.
Peter C.H. Pritchard, PhD
Board member (2010-2020)
Peter Pritchard was a world authority on the biology and conservation of turtles and tortoises and a founding Board member of Ocean Ecology Network (2010 - 2020). His extensive fieldwork and contributions to science and conservation took him to all continents and many remote islands earning him recognition as a “Champion of the Wild” by the Discovery Television Channel, “Hero of the Planet” by TIME Magazine, and “Floridian of the Year” by the Orlando Sentinel newspaper in 2001. The International Sea Turtle Society awarded him a “Lifetime Achievement Award.”
He was the founder and Director of the Chelonian Research Institute in Oviedo, Florida, USA, which serves as an extraordinary learning facility about the turtles and tortoises of the world. With more than 13,000-catalogued specimens it is the world’s third-largest turtle and tortoise museum collection that includes 270 of the world’s 300 recognized species of turtles. Three species of turtles are named after Peter Pritchard!
