Viktor grew up in Brazil and Germany. The forests of these countries started a lifelong fascination with ecology, behavior, and evolution. In 2015, he moved to California to study evolutionary biology at the University of California, Los Angeles.
There, he was involved with research on the coastal lagoons of southern California, primarily using environmental DNA. As part of his undergraduate studies, Viktor also conducted research in Moorea, French Polynesia, where he worked on two separate projects. One project investigated the functional group model for marine macro-algae, specifically differential top-down and bottom-up controls in the jointed calcareous algae group. The other project surveyed the remarkably diverse cryptofauna residing in otherwise relatively uncharismatic rhodoliths.
After graduating summa cum laude from UCLA, Viktor returned to the Red Sea to pursue an MSc degree in Marine Science at KAUST. Among other things, he remains interested in marine ecology, cryptofauna, and eDNA. He hopes to carry out research in the context of anthropogenic global change, with implications for conservation.
