Dr. Cortés Ortiz received her Ph.D. from the University of East Anglia in 2003; her dissertation focused on the evolution of howler monkeys. Part of her dissertation research was conducted at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. In 1998, she received a master's degree in Neuroethology from the Universidad Veracruzana, in Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico, with a dissertation on the mating behavior and social system of howler monkeys. She received her bachelor's degree in Biology from the Universidad Veracruzana in 1992. She joined the faculty of Universidad Veracruzana, as a permanent research professor at the Tropical Research Center (2003-2005). At the University of Michigan she was an Assistant Research Scientist from 2004-2013 and is currently an Research Associate Professor at the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. Dr. Cortés Ortiz's research interests include the evolution and systematics of Neotropical primates. Her work has focuses on phylogenetics and phylogeography of Neotropical primates, with particular emphasis on howler monkeys (genus Alouatta). Currently, she studies the evolutionary processes that have played a roll in the origin and maintenance of a hybrid zone between A. palliata and A. pigra, sister howler monkey species that diverged ~3 million years ago and are currently hybridizing in southeast Mexico. Additionally, she uses molecular tools to understand patterns of primate behavior and to establish basis for primate conservation.