Previous members of the group

Ofelia Delgado
Collections Manager and Molecular Lab Manager
(2010-2012)
Ofelia in the lab
Ofelia Delgado was born in Mexico City. She completed her B.Sc. in Biology at the Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) in 2000, based on a floristic survey of tropical dry forest. After graduating, she assisted in the curation of the Section of Odonata in the Insects National Collection, Instituto de Biología, UNAM for two years. She studied at that time the Odonata of Jalisco. Her experience in the field includes collections of arachnids, insects and plants in Central and Southern Mexico. After volunteering in Lorenzo Prendini’s molecular lab for several years, she came to work as the lab manager and technician in January 2010. Her research focused on sequencing and editing the DNA of sunspiders and scorpions. She also worked as the collections assistant for the scorpion systematics lab.

Jeremey Huff
Collections Manager
(2007-2010)


Jeremy Huff

Jeremy Huff was born in Toronto, Canada. He grew up in Picton, Ontario, where he worked with his father, Thomas Huff, at The Reptile Breeding Foundation and later at a public exhibit of live reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates called The Exotarium. He started his undergraduate degree at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, British Columbia, and is presently completing it at Rutgers University, New Jersey. Huff’s main research interest is the systematics of the whip scorpions (Thelyphonida). He volunteered in the Division of Invertebrate Zoology assisting with the upkeep of the Arachnid and Myriapod Collections from 2003–2007. He also worked part-time at the AMNH for Dr. Kimberly Russell photographing spiders for her project, SPIDA. Huff has extensive field experience collecting arachnids in Belize, Cameroon, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, French Guiana, Grand Cayman, Guatemala, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Malaysia, Martinique, Mexico, Senegal, South Africa and the southwestern USA. He has done 10 field trips to date for the AMNH and has collected several thousand specimens and discovered many new species.


Randy Mercurio
Scientific Assistant
(2002-2007)
Randy Mercurio
Randy Mercurio was born in New York. He volunteered for the AMNH from 1997 to 2002 while completing a B.A. in Biology at New York University. After graduating in 2001, he worked as the Metals Laboratory Supervisor for H2M Labs, performing environmental analyses on potable water, soil, and other matrices using optical emission spectroscopy and mass spectroscopy for heavy metals. Mercurio joined the Division of Invertebrate Zoology, AMNH, as a full-time employee in 2002, where he worked as Scientific Assistant to Lorenzo Prendini and managed the curation of the Arachnid and Myriapod Collections. Randy is a professional photographer and was responsible for producing many of the photographs in publications and the group's website. Mercurio was also in charge of emergency response for the Division of Invertebrate Zoology. He has extensive experience working with live organisms in captivity including arthropods, fish, reptiles, amphibians, bats and plants. His other research interests include the taxonomy, natural history, ecology and biogeography of centipedes in North America, as well as their functional morphology. Randy utilizes techniques of light and electron microscopy for much of his research. He has also collected arachnids and myriapods in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Massachusetts, New York, Nevada, Rhode Island, and Mexico.