PhD David Garcia de Leon

david.garcialh@uah.es

Global change negatively impacts the provision of ecosystem goods and services. Mitigation and adaptation to such impacts are a world-class priority. Therefore, disentangling the ecology of terrestrial ecosystems and their vulnerability to global change is a major concern for scientists and general society. This is particularly important in Baltic regions, as they are valuable, unique biodiversity reservoirs, and severely threatened by global change drivers.

One of my scientific priorities has been to understand the effects of major global change drivers (climate and land use changes) affecting the sustainability and management of ecosystems. I started as an undergraduate student contributing to the conservation of steppe birds threatened by fragmentation and land use intensification. During my doctoral studies, my research focused on the effects of climate change on plant demography, with an emphasis in agricultural systems. Specifically, I contributed to the understanding of the interactions between climate variables and weed populations in order to assess the potential impacts of climate change on their temporal dynamic and biogeography.