Andia Chaves-Fonnegra, a doctoral student at Nova Southeastern University’s Oceanographic Center, won an award for the Best Student Speed Talk during the Ninth World Sponge Conference. The international conference, which was held in early November in Fremantle, Western Australia, brings together sponge biologists from around the world. Andia’s presentation was about the population structure and dispersal of the coral excavating sponge Cliona delitrix within the Greater Caribbean Sea.
Andia is part of the Marine Microbiology and Genetics Laboratory at NSU’s Oceanographic Center and her research is in collaboration with the Field Museum of Chicago. Her research and studies have been possible thanks to support from the NSU Billfish Tournament Scholarship, the Colombian Colciencias scholarship and the UNESCO L’orèal Fellowship for young women in science.