Biography

I. Scientific trajectory.
Graduated in Biology at Univ. Málaga (1988), I carried out my PhD in this University in 1993. The same year I moved to the Faculty of Marine and Environmental Sciences (Univ. Cádiz), where I obtained a permanent position in the area of Ecology in 1998 and a chair in 2010. These studies on Marine Sciences were new, and a group of young researchers started to work together in ecology and physiology of seaweeds and seagrasses. We learned to build science from the ground up, from physiological aspects related to photobiology and nitrogen metabolism, to green tides dynamics, and effects of eutrophication on seagrass meadows. We have also studied the structure and dynamics of seagrass communities, focussing on herbivory and biogeochemistry. I have also worked in applications related to integrated aquaculture projects or application of the Water Framework Directive with macroalgae and seagrasses. From a training point of view, short PhD stays at UNCW at Wilmington (USA), and a Postdoct with Paul Falkowski at Brookhaven Natl. Lab. (USA) in 1995 gave me the opportunity to learn not only new techniques but new conceptions in Marine Science. Along my career I have published 75 articles, with a h-index of 29; 14 articles (2016-21) with h5-index of 9 and a Field Weighted Citation Impact of 1,75 (Scopus). My research has a high degree of internationalization. 30% of articles have foreign authors, a figure that rises to 43% in the last 5 years.

II. Contributions to society.
Throughout my career I have been involved in applied projects, and I have carried out science outreach and management in marine sciences. Regarding management, from 2010 to 2016 I was responsible for the research group EDEA. From November 2014 I was appointed as Director of the Marine Research Laboratory (Labimar) of UCA. I became in June 2016 General Director of Scientific Projection (Vic. Research), and from March 2017 to July 2019, General Coordinator of the international Campus of Excellence of the Sea (CEI.Mar). Along this period I have the opportunity to organize a multitude of outreach events at Labimar, such as scholar visits, exhibitions, and big outreach events. Since 2016, I represent Andalusian Universities as a member of the Board of “Fundacion Descubre”. As CEI.Mar coordinator, I set up annual action plans in academic, research, outreach activities and transference projects. All this leadership and management experience gave me a much broader, multidisciplinary and inclusive vision of marine sciences, and allow me to learn from the interaction with private companies and with public administration at local, regional, national and international levels. To complete international vocation, since 2016 I am the representative of UCA at Euromarine network, and member of the Steering Committee.

III. Training capacity of young researchers
Along my career I supervised 9 PhD Thesis (6 female/3 male). Today, two have permanent positions at Univ. Malaga and SZN (Naples, Italy). The others are assistant researcher at CCMAR (Faro, Portugal), 2 postdocts at UCA with own project contracts (Regional Government and Spanish Ministry of Science-JIN scheme), and the remaining in private companies (3) or as higher education lecturer (1). Those who follow a scientific career have developed their own research lines in relation to previous experience in our group.