Personal information

Portugal

Biography

When I started my PhD in 2007 phylogeographic research was heavily biased towards mobile animals and terrestrial paradigms dominated despite the very different environmental settings and biological communities found in the sea. This led me to focus on a different biological model – a low-dispersal macroalgae - and on the development of new conceptual models to explain differences in genetic composition and diversity across marine species ranges. During these formative years I have published several influential papers (>120 citations) linking climatic shifts and extant phylogeographic patterns, emphasising the role of poorly understood demographic-genetic (e.g. gene-surfing) effects. At this stage, idiosyncratic differences among related macroalgae sharing similar habitats, dispersal ecologies and distributions also became apparent. A key goal of my 2012-2018 post-doc project was precisely to disentangle individualistic vs community responses of macroalgae assemblages to large-scale climatic perturbations.

In the past years I have been analysing with molecular markers several assemblages with contrasting thermal affinities and distributions. I published several case studies and led a book-chapter review showing how glacial-interglacial cycles act to erase, concentrate, differentiate or homogenize gene pools across different parts of species ranges, and how extant climatic refugia are threatened by ongoing climatic change. Genetic work also revealed that hybridization can be an important evolutionary process in macroalgae evolution. Key findings include the introgression and even replacement of native organelle genomes among Fucus species and the description for the first time of marine hybrid polyploids among Pelvetiopsis.

In more recent years I have been trying to consolidate these research lines and expanding them into new directions, integrating more closely classical phylogeographic approaches with niche modelling and NGS data, embracing new models (e.g. southern African and Mediterranean endemics) and exploring novel biogeographical settings and hypotheses.

Activities

Employment (1)

University of Algarve: Faro, PT

2018-11 to present | Researcher
Employment
Source: Self-asserted source
João Neiva

Education and qualifications (2)

Universidade do Algarve: Faro, Faro, PT

2007 to 2012 | PhD
Education
Source: Self-asserted source
João Neiva

Universidade de Évora: Evora, Évora, PT

1999 to 2004 | Licenciatura
Education
Source: Self-asserted source
João Neiva

Funding (8)

FORESCUE - Innovative approaches FOr RESCUE and management of algal forests in the Mediterranean Sea

2023-04-01 to present | Contract
Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (Lisbon, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

DivProtect/0006/2021

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

MARFOR - Functional Variability and Dynamics of Responses of Marine Forests to Global Change

2018-01 to 2020-05 | Contract
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

ANR-16-EBI3-0005-01

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

EXTANT - Extant or extinct tipping points - climate changes drive genetic diversity and dynamics of range edge populations as evolutionary hotspots

2013-07 to 2016-06 | Contract
N/A (N/A, PT)
Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE
grade
Preferred source (of 2)‎

Drivers of phylogeographical structure in low-dispersal marine organisms – a community perspective

2013-02 to 2018-10 | Grant
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

SFRH/BPD/88935/2012

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

EDGES - Making edges meet: genetic signatures of climate-driven range shifts

2011-05 to 2012-12 | Contract
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

PTDC/AAC-CLI/109108/2008

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

Drifting fronds and drifting alleles: the genetic architecture of the estuarine seaweed Fucus ceranoides L.

2007-04 to 2012-05 | Grant
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

SFRH/BD/31017/2006

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

MATING - Ecology and evolution of mating systems in fucoid algae

2006-05 to 2007-03 | Contract
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

POCI/MAR/57499/2004

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE

POPA– Programa de Observação para as Pescas dos Açores

2005-06 to 2005-11 | Contract
N/A (N/A, PT)
GRANT_NUMBER:

Desconhecido

Source: check_circle
CIÊNCIAVITAE