Research lines

El IICG-URJC tiene su origen en el Área de Biodiversidad y Conservación de la URJC y en sus líneas y sub-líneas de investigación:

Impacts of global change on biodiversity

Effect of climate change on forests, relationship between climate and species composition and functional traits of trees and the dynamics and functioning of these ecosystems.
Effects of climate change on marine benthic species.
Effects of climate variation on population dynamics, reproductive strategies and biotic interactions of plants and lichens.
Evolutionary responses of vegetation to climate change.
Ecophysiological mechanisms of plants in forest ecosystems in tolerance to stress factors related to global change (pollutants, climate change, etc.).
Effects of global change on competitive interactions, biogeographical patterns in feeding and feeding adaptations in freshwater ecosystems.
Cumulative effects of multiple stressors on biodiversity and freshwater ecosystem functions.
Impacts of habitat alteration and climate change on the distribution and abundance of insect species.
Effects of fragmentation, habitat degradation and land use on lichen communities.
Plant-microbiome interactions under climate change scenarios.
Effect of increased drought on taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity of annual plant communities in gypsum soils.

Ecological impacts of invasive birds in urban environments.
Impacts of invasive species and climate change on coastal intertidal ecosystems.
Effects of biological invasions on epicontinental water systems.
Biotic interactions between native and invasive plant species.
Ecophysiological attributes that explain the invasibility of plant species.
Ecological impacts of invasive plant species on forest ecosystems.

Effects of soil structure and biodiversity on the restoration of degraded environments.
Restoration of coastal habitats.
Study of beneficial fungus/bacteria-plant interactions for forest restoration.
Evaluation of historical reforestations in terms of biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.
Forest plant cultivation and revegetation techniques to optimise the success of ecological restoration.
Wildlife habitat enhancement and environmental enrichment for ex situ conservation.

Adaptation and selection of agricultural species according to climate change scenarios and as a tool for adaptation to climate change.
Effects of crop diversification on the functioning of agricultural ecosystems.
Use of bacterial communities to improve crop safety, quality and productivity in sustainable agriculture.
Plant acclimatisation to changes in nutrient demands for selection of adapted crop varieties.
Diversity of free-living nematodes and plant parasites in agroecosystems.
Genetic diversity of adaptive value in plant genetic resources of wild origin, crop wild relatives, and their use for sustainable agriculture.

Effects of crop domestication and diversity on ecosystem services.
Valuation of ecosystem services in coastal zones.
Biodiversity, interactions and ecosystem services in Mediterranean forests.
Effects of land management on the physical, chemical and biological characteristics of soils as parameters of soil health.

Conservation of high mountain arthropod communities.
Conservation of lichen and fungi communities.
Conservation of forest plant species.
In situ and ex situ conservation of crop wild relatives and wild plants for food use.
Use of biogeography for vertebrate conservation.
Perception and conservation of steppe habitats.
Conservation of gypsophilous flora.

Ecological and evolutionary mechanisms responsible of species coexistence in tropical forests, semi-arid shrub and herbaceous communities, invertebrate communities in river communities, planktonic communities, etc.
Plant-soil, plant-plant, microbiome-plant and plant-pollinator interactions.

Evolutionary ecology of reproductive traits and sexual systems in plants.
Evolution of agricultural plants by comparison of agricultural plants and their wild progenitors.
Intraspecific variation, phenotypic plasticity and local adaptation.
Adaptive consequences of allopolyploidisation in ferns.
Diversity, evolution, interactions with other organisms, phylogeny and systematics of fungi and lichenised fungi.
Diversity, systematics and evolutionary relationships of edaphic nematodes.
Diversity, systematics, morphology, evolution and adaptations of marine invertebrates (meiofauna).
Reconstruction of the evolution of plant lineages of special interest to society.
Proximate and ultimate causes of the behaviour, function and evolution of social signals and their physiological mechanisms in birds.

Ecological and evolutionary mechanisms responsible of species coexistence in tropical forests, semi-arid scrub and herbaceous communities, invertebrate communities in river communities, planktonic communities, etc.
Plant-soil, plant-plant, microbiome-plant and plant-pollinator interactions.

Development of biofertilisers.
Obtaining H2 super-producing bacteria by redesigning microbial metabolic pathways.
Work with omics in different taxonomic groups to solve diverse ecological questions. Studies using phenomics, genomics, metagenomics, proteomics or transcriptomics of soil, marine mammal, bacterial or plant samples.
Development and evaluation of in vitro culture techniques for the production of forest plants, and characterisation of selected clones for tolerance to global change factors.
Comparative analysis of plant response to biotic and abiotic stresses at biochemical, molecular and physiological levels.

Diets and immunostimulatory effects in farmed fish species
Immune response and vaccine development in farmed species to different pathogens.
Individual and social immune response of ants and its interaction with nutrition and neurobiology.
Study of cellular ageing in animals generated by oxidative damage and mitochondrial production of free radicals.