Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Maine
Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources

Dr. Nuñez received a PhD in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management from the University of California, Berkeley and an MS from the University of Washington’s School of Environmental and Forest Sciences. He was an NSF Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Washington and a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Wyoming before joining the Maine Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit in 2023.

Dr. Nuñez is a quantitative ecologist with specific expertise in spatial computational ecology, habitat and distribution modeling, landscape connectivity, and climate adaptation. His work provides wildlife and land management practitioners with models, data, and insights into the dynamics affecting ecosystems in a rapidly changing world. Examples include developing a method to map wildlife corridors in support of climate resilience in partnership with the multi-stakeholder Washington Habitat Connectivity Working Group, leading the first study that tracked hippos with GPS technology, and working with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game and the Wyoming Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit to develop a maximum-likelihood-based connectivity model optimization methodology to predict mule deer migration corridors. His current interests focus on high-performance computing and the near-term forecasting of ecological phenomena, including plant phenology and animal distributions and movements.