Erik N. K. Iverson, Ph.D.

I am an evolutionary ecologist, conservationist, and writer from San Francisco, California. I recently finished my PhD at the University of Texas at Austin, studying environmental adaptation, hybridization, and mitonuclear interactions in the lab of Justin Havird. My interests lie in understanding the forces that generate biodiversity and protecting these ecological and evolutionary wonders for future generations.

Currently, I am a faculty member of Wildlands Studies, an interdisciplinary field program taught in countries around the world. I will teach the Indonesian Islands course for Summer 2027; in the past, I’ve have also taught in Australia, Chile, and Ecuador.

You can find some of my environmental reporting at Mongabay.

Past activities of mine have included studying the ecology of wetlands and savannas, researching urban wildlife, and managing an avian neuroscience lab. In 2016, I received my M.S. in Environmental Biology from Tulane University, where I also had completed my undergraduate degree. I began working with the Alliance for a Sustainable Amazon in 2017, helping to study, restore, and conserve rainforest near Puerto Maldonado, Peru. I have served on land trusts, conservation grant panels, and advisory boards, helping to implement conservation policies at multiple levels.