After a long stint in the IT world, Antonio decided to quit IT to pursue a life-long passion: archaeology/anthropology.

Although the journey has been quite challenging, he has completed a B.S. degree with cum laude honors and a Masters – both in Evolutionary Anthropology/Archaeology – at Rutgers University New Brunswick. He also earned a Documentary Filmmaking Certificate from Rutgers Mason Gross School of the Arts, studying under National Geographic’s Peter Schnall, “Made in India” director Rebecca Haimowitz, and other amazing creative minds.

No one will ever know the emotional and financial sacrifices he endured for that near-decade of studying nor the many nights of sleeping in the back of his Xterra.

Antonio’s academic interests include human origins, evolution, paleoenvironments, hominin adaptations, archaeology, geology, and anthropology.

Other fields that stimulate Antonio’s curiosity are botany, ethnobotany, soils, paleontology, astronomy, remote sensing, and GIS.

Exploring how technologies can be fused with archaeology, his Lake Turkana digital elevation model created from NASA satellite data was featured in Blue Marble Geographics’ newsletter.

A major source of inspiration for Antonio is the astrophysicist Carl Sagan. Carl has seduced his mind & heart with the beauty of science and the wonders of the cosmos. Carl’s book “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark” and his series “Cosmos” are paramount influences in Antonio’s life.

During downtime, Antonio can be found exploring the vast outdoors, local geological features, and the nature of New Jersey with his drone, camera, and muddied jeans.