Itziar Alvarez Ellacuria
of my career (2004) I have juggled my job as a technician with my research activity. Recently (June, 2015), I got my Doctorate in Marine Science by the Balearic University (UIB) after the public exposition of the PhD Thesis entitled: “Multiscale environment-ichthyoplankton assemblage relationships in the Balearic Sea”.
For the moment, I have contributed to 13 SCI papers, 2 book chapters and have participated in both European projects (SESAME and SARDONE (FP6), ECOKNOWS (FP7), MINOW and CERES (H2020)) and in 17 Spanish-funded national projects (see CV). For the dissemination of the results obtained in these projects, I have participated in a total of 21 International symposiums with 28 contributions. I am part of the 43rd Annual Larval Fish Conference Organizing Comitee (Mallorca, 21-24 May 2019), and have actively participated in the organization of 3 international conferences before. I have also spent some time abroad for training purposes in Crete and Hamburg. I have been invited to review papers in 5 scientific journals and one of them has awarded me as Outstanding Reviewer (Estuarine Coastal and Shelf Science). Finally, I have trained a total of 5 Master and PhD students in ichthyoplankton sorting and identification and in preparation and interpretation of age and growth from hard structures in fish.
My scientific interest focuses on the relationship between external factors (environmental effects at all scales, including global change) and internal factors (reproduction, behaviour) and the recruitment processes in marine species. Although I am a specialist on ichthyoplankton, the fact that ecosystems are compound by open compartments interrelated among them makes it necessary to also investigate on the closer compartments such as marine fito- and zooplankton. Most of my scientific production focuses on the diverse relationships among these three compartments and their relationship with variations on environment such as seasonality, distance to coast or ocean circulation, among others. In addition, as a combined method to infer past events on the fish life, I have performed several work related to schlerochronology mainly focused on daily growth (larvae and juvenile in most cases) to relate changes in somatic growth with environmental variability. In other cases I have also worked with seasonal rings following other objectives. I have participated in more than 30 ocean surveys, from months spent on oceanographic vessels to day trips on small boats.