Email: [email protected]

Tel: 01248 382337 (from U.K.)
+44 1248 382337 (International)

Google Scholar, ORCID, ResearchGate

Tropical forest ecology, Functional ecology, Restoration ecology, Plant-enemy interactions 


As a researcher, I am primarily driven by a deep fascination with biodiversity, which has led me to focus much of my work on biologically rich tropical forest ecosystems. My research investigates the processes that underpin plant function and coexistence, with a particular emphasis on the mechanisms that generate and maintain biodiversity.

A central theme in my work is negative density dependence (NDD)—the phenomenon by which natural enemies, such as pathogens and herbivores, mediate density-dependent mortality among tropical plants. I explore how these biotic interactions shape regeneration dynamics and community composition. Beyond this, I study physiological responses of plants to resource limitation, competition, and environmental change, particularly in relation to water and light availability. My research also examines how variation in plant functional traits influences individual performance and species distributions, from local to cross-ecosystem scales.

I am currently a Senior Lecturer in Forest Science at the School of Environmental and Natural Sciences, Bangor University, and an Associate Professor in Ecology within the Area of Biodiversity and Conservation at the Global Change Research Institute (IICG-URJC) of the University Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid, Spain.

I hold a Ph.D. in Tropical Forest Ecology, as well as M.Sc. and B.Sc. degrees in Tropical Land Use from Wageningen University in the Netherlands. My postdoctoral research has included collaborations with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) and academic institutions such as the Universities of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (USA), Oxford (UK), Yale (USA), Oregon State (USA), and Bayreuth (Germany).

Teaching:

Module coordinator:

• DXX-2017 Forest Health
• ENS-4307 Ecological Restoration

Module contributions:

• DXX-3701 Honours Project
• DXX-4999 MSc Dissertation
• ENS-4306 Silviculture
• ENS-4319 Tropical Study Tour - Uganda
• ENS-4408 Biodiversity and Ecosystem Function
• ENS-4321 MSc Dissertation

Biography

I obtained my PhD in 2010 from Wageningen University (the Netherlands), where my dissertation focused on the functional ecology of tropical tree species. Specifically, I examined how drought and shade tolerance strategies influence species coexistence and distribution along resource gradients. In early 2010, I was awarded a two-year Rubicon Fellowship by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). This allowed me to collaborate with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama and the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (UWM), where I studied the role of plant hydraulics in explaining differences in drought performance between liana and tree species. In late 2011, I relocated to Spain for a one-year research visit with the Ecology and Global Change Group at the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN-CSIC) in Madrid. In 2013, I joined the University of Oxford as a postdoctoral researcher in the NERC-funded project Natural enemies, climate, and the maintenance of tropical tree diversity, based at the Community Ecology Research Oxford (CERO) group in collaboration with STRI. This project tested the hypothesis that humidity drives variation in tropical plant diversity through its influence on the interactions between plants and their natural enemies. Following the 2015–2016 El Niño event, I was appointed postdoctoral researcher on a US NSF RAPID-funded project examining the immediate impacts of extreme drought on plant physiology and regeneration dynamics across a tropical rainfall gradient. This collaborative effort involved Oregon State University, Yale School of Forestry, the University of Bayreuth, and STRI. In 2016, I was appointed Lecturer in Forest Sciences at the School of Environmental and Natural Sciences (SENS) and additionally held a SÊR Cymru – MSCA CoFund Research Fellowship. I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2019. In 2020, I joined the Area of Biodiversity and Conservation, at the Global Change Research Institute, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (IICG-URJC), as a Distinguished Research Professor under the Beatriz Galindo Fellowship. In 2023, I was awarded a tenured position as Associate Professor in Ecology, which I currently hold, alongside my continued appointment as Senior Lecturer at Bangor University in a reduced capacity.

Qualifications 

2010                PhD Tropical forest ecology Wageningen University, the Netherlands

2005                MSc Tropical land use Wageningen University, the Netherlands