Antigonio Kaliontzopoulo, Ramon y Cajal researcher at IRBio

The aim of the Ramon y Cajal grants is to promote the incorporation of research personnel with an outstanding track record in Spanish R&D centres, so that they can acquire the skills and abilities that will enable them to obtain a stable position in a research organisation in the Spanish Science, Technology and Innovation System.

Antigoni Kaliontzopoulo is a researcher at the Institute for Research on Biodiversity (IRBio) of the UB and the Department of Evolutionary Biology, Ecology and Environmental Sciences of the Faculty of Biology, and was awarded the Ramón y Cajal grant at IRBio in 2021. Before that she had been a researcher at CIBIO/UP, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos (Portugal).

Her research focuses on the evolution of phenotypic diversity, mainly using reptiles and amphibians as model organisms, combining tools such as geometric morphometrics, multivariate statistics and phylogenetic comparative methods to provide a better understanding of the links between phenotypic traits, ecology and evolution.

Phenotypes and biodiversity in the Mediterranean Basin

The MEDBIODIV H2020 project explores the ecological and evolutionary dynamics that have shaped the Mediterranean basin as one of the world's unique biodiversity hotspots.

The aim is to understand the temporal and spatial framework in which diversification processes operate through different innovative analytical tools using reptiles and amphibians as model organisms and by studying macroecological dynamics linked to phenotypic macroevolution and their functional and ecological importance.

Thus, reaching new insights into the ability of organisms to respond to environmental change, and tools to determine the organic, temporal and spatial scale at which conservation measures should be implemented.

More information:

https://sites.google.com/view/akaliontzopoulou/home

https://sites.google.com/view/phenevol/about-us