I am an ecologist focused on understanding how communities respond to biotic and abiotic factors along natural and human-made environmental gradients. In particular, I am interested in the relationship between multiple facets of biodiversity (taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic) and climate, edaphic factors and disturbance -such as grazing and habitat transformation- and its implications to ecosystem processes and services. More recently, I have been also focused on understanding how environmental factors drive community assembly rules in drylands using biological soil crusts (lichens, bryophytes and cyanobacteria living in the soil surface) as a model system.

Currently, I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Biology and Geology - Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (Spain) and a team member of the Dryland Ecology and Global Change Lab led by Prof. Fernando T. Maestre.