School: University of the Philippines Los Baños

Jazz Ong is a wildlife educational speaker, herpetologist, and conservationist with the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity and LIGHT TV. Her primary work however is as the founder and director of Wildlife Matters.

Seigmund Jacob Dollolasa is a Research & Development Engineer at Era Polymers Pty. Ltd. in Australia. As their Research & Development Engineer, he handles the development and improvement of polymer products both new and existing.

Charles John Gunay is a licensed agricultural and biosystems engineer. His research specializes primarily in hydraulics, water resources engineering, and watershed and dam management.

Jabez Joshua Flores is an environmental scientist and a senior lecturer at UP Open University and the University of the Philippines Rural High School. In 2022, Jabez took on a number of roles, creating maps as a spatial data scientist at the Pure Earth Blacksmith Institute and starting his fellowship with One Health for the NGOHP Program at St. Luke’s Medical Center College of Medicine.

Heidi Mendoza is a PhD Candidate at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Institute for Environmental Studies in the Netherlands. Her research focuses on stories of drought-to-flood events in the Peruvian Amazon.

Wilfredo Barrera Jr. is taking up his Joint National PhD in Sustainable Development and Climate Change. For his current PhD, Wilfredo is exploring impact and adaptation strategies for crops through the lens of climate change and water resources.

Jovale Vincent Tongco is a chemist who specializes in wood chemistry and forest biomaterials. He has worked on a variety of projects exploring the processing and potential uses of lignocellulosic biomass.

Krystel Mae Peñaflor is a licensed forester, conservationist, and climate analyst currently working as an Environmental Health and Safety Officer at Kenelton Engineering Services. She also leads two co-founded youth organizations: Youth Climate Navigators and EmpoWoment Storytellers: Women for Climate and Biodiversity.

Joan Talubo is an Assistant Professor at the UPLB Department of Community and Environmental Resource Planning. Her doctoral thesis assessed island socio-ecological resilience for disaster risk and recovery planning in the Philippines.

Dianne Aguilon, an entomologist and Assistant Professor at the University of the Philippines Los Baños. Her research interests include insect life history, insect diversity, ant ecology and taxonomy, pollination ecology, forest insect pests, among others.

Jonas Dumdum, a registered chemist and consultant at the think-tank Nomura Research Institute Singapore, Manila branch. Through the years, Jonas has held several roles in the sustainability sector.

Kier Pitogo is a wildlife biologist with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources – PENRO South Cotabato. Kier leads biodiversity field surveys in forest and wetland habitats, as well as maintains a biodiversity database system that is then used to inform science and evidence-based policy interventions.

Johnathan Sarines is a molecular biologist in action amidst and for the global health crisis. His undergraduate thesis elucidated the effects of certain Philippine berries towards enzyme targets for diabetes.

Jerome de Leon is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Tokyo. He founded the Filipino Astronomy Community (FilAstroComm) and is also currently a mentor at SIDHI which provides mentorship to high school students.

Carla Bertulfo is a PhD candidate in Biological Sciences at Columbia University. For Carla’s doctoral studies, they are using the Nobel Prize-winning gene editing technology CRISPR to explore combinatorial therapies against T cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Justine Millado is a soon-to-be Doctor of Agricultural Science from Nagoya University. Her doctoral thesis focuses on analyzing apoptosis regulation in the domestic silk moth.

Ronilo “Onille” Flores is an Assistant Professor at the University of the Philippines Los Banos (UPLB) and Associate Dean of the UPLB Graduate School. Onille’s current research projects revolve on microbial ecology and biotechnology toward planetary health which includes exploring microoganisms from different habitats and sources and their biotechnological and medical applications.

Mae Mercado is an Agriculture and Agronomy practitioner. She used to be a researcher and assistant scientist at the International Rice Research Institute.

Kent Sorgon is a marine scientist and a research associate for the FISH ARK project for Taal Lake, which seeks to conserve the endemic tawilis found in the water body.

Nikki Dyanne Realubit is a graduate student in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Kansas. Nikki was the project leader for establishing the ecological information on the McGregor’s pit viper in Batanes, a project coordinator for terrestrial biodiversity research methods on the birds of Tawi-Tawi and a biology teacher at the Holistic Education and Development Center in Taytay, Rizal.