Core Team
Maxim Larrivée, PhD
Insectarium Montréal
Founder & Director of eButterfly
Max is the director of the Insectarium Montréal. His research explores how global change impacts the distribution of butterflies. He has strong interests in biodiversity information management and the macroecology of insects.
Jeremy Kerr, PhD
University of Ottawa
Founder of eButterfly and Principal Investigator
Jeremy is a Professor of Biology at the University of Ottawa. His intellectual contributions and research support were instrumental to the original development of eButterfly, which is part of his Canada Global Change Transect (CGCT) project. He is Vice President (and President-elect) of the Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution, holds the University Research Chair in Macroecology and Conservation, and is both a Science Leadership Fellow and an inaugural fellow of the Global Young Academy.
Kent McFarland, MS
Vermont Center for Ecostudies – Vermont Atlas of Life
Co-director of eButterfly
Kent is a senior conservation biologist at the Vermont Center for Ecostudies in Norwich, Vermont. His research focuses on bird and butterfly ecology and conservation. He has wide-ranging experiences and interests in community science, communications and conservation photography.
Xinbao Zhang
Co-founder of eButterfly and Head Software Developer
Xinbao is a computer scientist interested in bioinformatics, database creation and community science. He translates our eButterfly ideas and wants into reality. He’s nothing short of a wizard. When not busy coding, we hope he practices swinging a net.
Michael Bunsen
Software and DevOps Engineer
Michael is a computer scientist with far-ranging interests in the intersection of biology and computer science. On any given day, he could be working on a giant taxonomy list, spinning up a new server, implementing a computer vision model, or perhaps teasing us with his latest butterfly photo. He has been the lead developer in creating the eButterfly global taxonomy.
Rodrigo Solis, DVM, PhD
eButterfly Human Network and Data Coordinator
Rodrigo is a Resource and Environmental Management PhD at Simon Fraser University, Canada. His main research interest lies within the social-ecological interphase of the Monarch Butterfly conservation. He has worked with the Monarch for 8 years and collaborated with several organizations such as WWF-Mexico. He Joined the eButterfly team in 2019 as the Human Network and Data Coordinator after doing a 6-month internship at the Montreal Insectarium.
Regional Project Leads
Juliana Saenz Villada
eButterfly Ambassador in Colombia
An empirical lepidopterist researcher since the age of 8, she specializes in the identification of species in Colombia, as well as the study of butterfly life cycles, their host plants, and nectar plants. Our eButterfly ambassador in South America, where she carries out citizen science activities, training research groups and butterfly enthusiasts. Additionally, she contributes to social media management and actively participates in butterfly observation.
Kevin Gauthier
eButterfly Ambassador in Panama
Kevin is an entomologist dedicated to advancing long-term monitoring of Lepidoptera and the innovative research it enables. Passionate about multidisciplinary advocacy for insects, he aims to shift social attitudes toward a healthier coexistence with these essential members of our ecosystems. His work integrates entrepreneurship, project management, and biodiversity science to drive eButterfly’s mission of understanding and conserving butterfly diversity.
Past Co-Ops and Interns
Deborah Shen
University of Waterloo Coop
Deborah is a Computing and Financial Management student at the University of Waterloo and worked as a Mobile and Web Developer for eButterfly from January 2024 to April 2024. Most of her co-op term was focused on learning mobile app development, where she fixed, added, and tested features of the eButterfly mobile app for its release. The remainder of her time was spent completing updates for the eButterfly website. She enjoyed working with a team that was so passionate about their work and hopes to continue developing her professional skills while finding the same enthusiasm in her future roles. Deborah continues to collaborate with the eButterfly team as a part-time developer.
Mairah Hashmi
University of Waterloo Coop
Mairah is a Computer Engineering student at the University of Waterloo. During her time with the eButterfly mobile app, she contributed to the development of upcoming features for future releases. Her role involved not only implementing new features but also conducting rigorous unit testing and maintaining the app with bug fixes. This ensured the high quality and reliability of the application. As she advances in her career, Mairah is dedicated to using her engineering expertise to address complex challenges and create impactful technological solutions.
Shivangi Garg
University of Waterloo Coop
Shivangi is a Computer Engineering student at the University of Waterloo. She was the first co-op student to join the team and has navigated through front-end, back-end, and mobile app development during her multiple co-op terms with us. Collaborating with an incredible team, she cherished the diverse challenges that came her way. What set eButterfly apart for her was not just the technical exposure but the gratification of seeing her contributions utilized in production.
Vivek Alamuri
University of Waterloo Coop
Vivek is a Computer Engineering student at the University of Waterloo. He worked as a Software Developer with us for his first co-op from Jan 2021 to April 2021, contributing to the migration from Angular to React, and developing the Projects feature. He loved the team’s energy and enthusiasm for butterflying and taking this project to a greater reach! In the future, Vivek plans to work in AI, on the frontline of innovative research.
Kun Zhu
University of Waterloo Coop
Kun is a University of Waterloo student studying Stats/CO with a minor in Cognitive Science. She is curious about the intersection between technology and empathy and appreciates creative expressions of all forms. She worked with us between September – December 2021, helping us with revamping the frontend codebase of the web app from Angular to React for eB
Richard Zhang
University of Waterloo Coop
Teddy Fong
University of Waterloo Coop
Teddy is a biochemistry student studying at the University of Waterloo, particularly interested in fungi, their properties and their relationships with other species. Part of the eButterfly team from January 4th to April 22nd, 2022, he mainly helped as a web developer and with website QA. He hopes he’ll catch up on his schoolwork one day and can go butterflying like he’s been saying he would.
Amy Hu
University of Waterloo Coop
Adam Courchense
University of Waterloo Coop
Mark Ma
University of Waterloo Coop
Anirudh Goel
University of Waterloo Coop
Connor Kendall
University of Waterloo WE Accelerate and Coop
Mehdi Haned
University of Waterloo WE Accelerate
Sitansh Mehta
University of Waterloo WE Accelerate
Anish Khurana
University of Waterloo WE Accelerate
Amanda Yuan
University of Waterloo WE Accelerate
Vetting experts for TEA
Kirstyn Eckhardt
University of Manitoba
I’m a graduate student in Entomology at the University of Manitoba, studying the growth and development of an endangered prairie butterfly. You can find me outdoors with my camera, chasing butterflies in my free time.
Alexandra Gregg
Simon Fraser University
Alexandra Gregg is an undergraduate student at Simon Fraser University studying the ecology and conservation of Canadian butterfly species. She is currently interested in specialist-generalist relationships, and her favourite butterfly is the Plebejus icarioides.
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