Virginie Ramasco - sharing the joy of data crunching

We welcome Virginie Ramasco to Akvaplan-niva. Virginie came to Tromsø in 2005, right after finishing her MSc degree in general ecology in Italy, her home country. Virginie says that she has been living in Tromsø since and that she now considers it to be home."I took both a MSc and a PhD in marine ecology at UiT, in collaboration with the Institute of Marine Research in Tromsø, where I also worked for a while. During my academic career I moved from a specific focus on marine mammal ecology, such as seals’ foraging behavior and spatial movement, to a broader interest in numerical ecology and statistical analysis. Through collaboration in different research projects, I specialized in the management and analysis of large ecological datasets, geostatistical models of species distributions, spatial analysis of animal movement, individual resource selection and foraging models, analysis of taxonomic and functional communities at sea".

Virginie has a broad experience in the use of R statistical computing and Geographical Information Systems (GIS), and states that she found herself loving to share the joys and challenges of programming with colleagues. "Right after my PhD, I took a 4-years period away from science, running a private business, where I gained valuable insight in project and personnel management, economy, marketing and leadership. I now happily return to science with new perspectives, but with the same old passion for data crunching and problem solving".

We hope that Virginie will enjoy working with us at Akvaplan-niva and we look forward to sharing the joy of data crunching with her.