NMSU Honors student named NSF research fellow

Alejandro Gomez, a senior honors student at New Mexico State University studying wildlife ecology, has been awarded the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, which provides three years of support over a five-year fellowship period for the graduate education of individuals who have demonstrated potential for significant research achievements in STEM or STEM education.

Gomez, who is also a McNair Scholar, will continue his education at NMSU, where he will study for a master’s degree under the advisement of Obed Hernández-Gómez, assistant professor of wildlife disease ecology in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences.

Their research will focus on disease dynamics in native and non-native ungulates in New Mexico, exploring parasite and bacterial load and presence. Ungulates are any of a group of typically plant-eating four-footed hoofed mammals.