My career path

Bachelor's degree in Biology from the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM) in 2006. In 2007, I conducted my dissertation on avian parasitology directed by Dr. Javier Pérez-Tris in the Department of Zoology and Physical Anthropology at the UCM, obtaining the highest rate in June 2008. That same year I obtained a 6-month fellowship in the Department of Ecology at the UCO, under the supervision of Prof. Juan Fernández-Haeger. I finished the official Master's degree in Conservation Biology in 2009, and that same year I started my Ph.D. in Evolutionary Biology within the Official Postgraduate Program in Biology (UCM) thanks to an FPI fellowship, which was directed by Dr. Diego Gil and Dr. Lorenzo Pérez-Rodríguez at the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN, Spain). I presented my thesis for defense in January 2016, obtaining the highest rate. I have published 32 SCI-indexed papers (482 citations and h-index=12) and publicized my research in 30 communications at national or international congresses. I have participated in 15 funded projects and been awarded 6 fellowships. During my stay at the MNCN, I have carried out several international and national collaborations and I had three contracts as a research assistant (2014, 2017, and 2018). After spending a few months in the UK (2016), I worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Evolutionary Ecology at the MNCN-CSIC (2017-2018). Between May 2018 and September 2019, I held a postdoctoral contract associated with Alfonso Marzal's lab at the University of Extremadura to investigate the evolutionary ecology of avian malaria. I subsequently joined Jesús Martínez-Padilla's team (Sep. 2019-Oct. 2021) as a Juan de la Cierva-Formación postdoc researcher at the Pyrenean Institute of Ecology (CSIC) to investigate how environmental conditions influence the evolutionary dynamics of phenotypes in wild birds.  I joined the Department of Zoology at the University of Granada in 2021 as a teaching assistant to teach Ethology and Zoology for the next 6 months, and I subsequently obtained a postdoctoral researcher contract for scientific excellence at the Institute for Game and Wildlife Research (IREC-CSIC) under the Plan Propio de I+D+i of the UCLM. In this project, we investigated the effects of two of the main families of yolk compounds (androgens and antioxidants) on key aspects of offspring performance and physiological traits. In September 2023, the European Commission awarded me a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowship to join the Animal Ecology lab at the University of Turku (UTU, Finland), where I was working on the MATHORMAL project (101063149 — HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01). Most recently, I have secured a teaching position as an assistant professor (Zoology) in the Department of Zoology at the University of Córdoba (Spain), where I continue to combine my research expertise with teaching responsibilities. My main lines of research have focused on maternal effects, followed by ecophysiology, host-parasite interactions, and habitat selection, particularly in avian models.

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Regarding teaching activity, I have actively participated in the design, execution, and follow-up of six Master's Theses (3 students from the UEx, 2 students from the UCM, and 2 from Université de Lyon/Saint-Etienne (France)) and nine End of course projects (6 students from the UEx, 2 students from the URJC, 1 student from UGR). I have participated as co-director of the Doctoral Thesis entitled "Effects and consequences of host-haemoparasite interactions in amphibians and reptiles", defended by Dr. Manuel González Blázquez at the University of Extremadura in July 2021. I also have the Certificate of Pedagogical Aptitude (CAP) from the School of Educational Sciences (UCM), and I have given talks in training courses, highlighting my high involvement in the MuEuCAP training program in Myanmar (EU Erasmus+ project).

 

I have obtained the Professor's accreditation (Associate Professor - "Contratado Doctor") by National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA) in July 2023, and the certificate of training course in laboratory animal science for scientists responsible for the design or conduct of animal experiments (Functions A, B, C, and D) by the UEx in 2019-2020. I have also participated in courses, seminars, and conferences, as well as in many bird-ringing campaigns. Additionally, I have participated as a reviewer of 34 scientific manuscripts in Science Citation Index (SCI) journals.