Maria Elena Rojas Pena

Maria was born and raise in Iquitos, Peru, and earned her B.S. in Tropical Rainforest Ecology from the Universidad Nacional de la Amazonia Peruana, Iquitos. Following her undergraduate studies, Maria worked for five years at Instituto de Investigaciones de la Amazonia Peruana – IIAP, where she contributed to research monitoring protected areas to assess changes in forest structure and biodiversity. There, she also worked on projects evaluating forest resilience to human disturbance and analyzing plant functional traits under simulated future climate conditions.

Maria is currently pursuing a Masters’s of Science in Natural Resources with emphasis on Watershed Management and Ecohydrology at the University of Arizona. Her research focuses on soil microbial community dynamics in Andean parámos ecosystems, examining how long-term experimental warming influences community composition and richness. Through this work, she aims to contribute to a better understanding of ecosystem response to climate change in high-elevation tropical systems.

She receives funding from Lovejoy Center and is affiliated with Rachel Gallery Lab.

Relatively new to Tucson, Maria has come to appreciate the unique desert landscapes of southern Arizona. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family exploring nature, and continues to be inspired by her connection to tropical ecosystems and conservation.