Julián Monge-Nájera is a Costa Rican ecologist, scientific editor, educator and photographer born in 1960.
For many years he has acted as scientific adviser for the BBC and the National Geographic Society. Regional Editor of the United Nations' Global Environmental Outlook ("GEO Report"). He has been a researcher at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, the National Museum of Costa Rica, the University of Costa Rica and the Distance Education University of Costa Rica. He has also done research as part of teams with the USDA (USA), Uppsala University (Sweden), University of New South Wales (Australia) and the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology (China). He is Curator of the Encyclopedia of Life (USA) and Team Member of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Switzerland).
He is author or co-author of 20 books published by several Costa Rican universities, Oxford University, the National Biodiversity Institute (INBio) and Tropical Nature Press. He has written nearly 60 specialized papers about tropical ecology, biogeography and evolution, as well as about applied ecology (pollution and pests) and distance education, in international journals published in Europe, Costa Rica and the USA, including the prestigious Linnean Society of London. He also authored about 50 educational papers, a hundred essays and 30 scientific meeting papers as well as many Internet web pages.
He has been editor in chief of Revista de Biología Tropical, Brenesia, Boletín de Biotecnología, Medicina Legal, Paz y Ambiente, Revista Latinoamericana de Derecho Médico y Medicina Legal, and
Odontología Actual,as well as editor for several INBio books. He has taught Research Methods, History of Biological Thought, Scientific Photography, General Biology and Bioethics in public and private universities.
Editorial board member of the following publications: Verde (Mexico, D.F.), Historia Naturalis (Río de Janeiro, Brazil), Gayana (Chile) and Biología Tropical, Biocenosis, Lankesteriana and Repertorio Científico (Costa Rica). Scientific reviewer for Five Kingdoms, by L. Margulis and K. V. Schwartz (Freeman, N. York, 1998). In 1996 elected Member of the Société de Biogeographie, Paris, and member of the Costa Rican Ombudsman Academic Advisory Board and of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Wilson Botanical Garden, Organization for Tropical Studies. Honorary Member, American Biographical Institute Research Board of Advisors. The Parisian Courrier published his essay on Internet for the net's 25th anniversay.
In 1997 his biography was added to Who's Who in the World, followed by the Dictionary of International Biography of Cambridge in 1998, Outstanding People of the 20th Century in 2001, and 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals of the 21st Century in 2002. Former Director of Academic Production at UNED. An invertebrate species has been named in his honor in the Paris Natural History Museum. He lives with his wife, malacologist Zaidett Barrientos, his son Andrés and his daughter Estefanie in Heredia, Costa Rica. His hobbies are nature and figure photography, as well as camping and writing.
Julian Monge - Nájera / State Distance Education University (UNED), Costa Rica /
