Advisory Board and Editors Ecology
Diaa Abd El-Moneim
My academic journey began with an MSc in Plant Breeding and Genetics at Suez Canal University, where my research focused on evaluating drought tolerance and disease resistance in wheat, providing a solid foundation in abiotic stress tolerance. This early work fueled my commitment to understanding and addressing plant resilience under stress conditions. Thanks to an Erasmus Mundus scholarship, I pursued my PhD at Complutense University of Madrid, where I investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying aluminum stress tolerance in rye. Notably, I was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship funded by AECID just before defending my thesis—a pivotal achievement that underscored the relevance of my research. This fellowship enabled me to join the National Center of Biotechnology (CNB) in Madrid. I gained expertise in proteomics, gene expression analysis, and molecular tool development to improve plant abiotic stress resilience. These experiences greatly expanded my knowledge of gene regulation and stress physiology and led to high-impact publications in peer-reviewed journals.
Dr. Abd El Moneim’s research encompasses multiple domains, including the study of morphological , physiological, and molecular mechanisms that govern plant responses to stress factors such as salinity, drought , aluminum toxicity, heat, and pathogens. His work in identifying gene families and stress-responsive proteins is complemented by his efforts to apply DNA barcoding and chloroplast genomic assemblies for species identification and development of molecular markers, as well as contributing to taxonomical and evolutionary concepts and identifying transcriptional regulators critical for stress adaptation, with particular emphasis on crops like wheat and wild plants adapted to extreme environments. His methodologies include designing and analyzing field trials , protein analysis, nucleic acid extraction, fingerprinting , GWAS , and the characterization of chloroplast genomes. Dr. Abd El Moneim’s expertise in molecular breeding and genomics focuses on improving abiotic stress tolerance in staple crops, especially for agriculture in developing countries.
Susana Agusti
Dr. Susana Agusti is Professor of Marine Science at KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology) at the Red Sea Research Center, and Adjunct Professor at the University of Tromsø (Norway).
She holds Bachelors and Ph.D. degrees from the Autonomous University of Madrid.
Formerly she was Research Professor with the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), and Professorial Fellow with the UWA Oceans Institute and the School of Plant Biology at the University of Western Australia (Australia).
Nigel R Andrew
My current research interests focus on the impacts of a rapidly changing climate and environment on insect behaviour, ecology and physiology; insect community structure along environmental gradients; and insect-plant interactions.
I am currently Editor-in-Chief of Austral Ecology. a Fulbright Senior Scholar (2020) and an Australian Research Council College of Experts panel member.
Alexandre Anesio
Alexandre Magno Anesio is a Professor of Biogeochemistry in the School of Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol. He is also the Director for the Bristol Glaciology Centre. Anesio gained his PhD in 2000 from Sweden and came to the UK as a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow in 2003. His research interests are broad, and he combines concepts from Geography, Biology and Chemistry to understand the carbon and nutrient cycle in the cryosphere. In the past 14 years, Anesio has conducted fieldwork in the Arctic, including on the Greenland Ice Sheet and Greenland glaciers (e.g., Kangerlussuaq, Zackenberg, Tassilaq) to demonstrate the impact of microbial processes on a) albedo reduction, b) production, accumulation and export of organic carbon and nutrients to downstream ecosystems and c) the diversity and biogeochemical cycles of subglacial environments. He has secured grants as PI from a variety of sources which includes the UK Research Council (NERC), UK Charities (e.g., Leverhulme Trust, Nuffield Foundation) and the EU (Marie Curie Fellowship and Innovative Training Network). Anesio was elected the 2016 Distinguished Lecturer by the European Geochemistry Association.
Carmen Arena
Carmen Arena is Associate Professor in Ecology at the Department of Biology of the University of Naples Federico II. She conducts researches in the ecological disciplines, dealing with studies concerning photosynthesis and morpho-functional adaptation strategies of higher plants and macroalgae in response to mono and multiple stresses in natural and controlled environments, with applications in ecological, biotechnological and agronomic field.
The research activity holds three main issues:
1) Regulation of the photosynthetic process in higher plants and macroalgae in response to ecological factors in the context of environmental change.
2) Study of plant growth in an extra-terrestrial environment.
3) Plant-soil interactions in natural and anthropized ecosystems.
These researches include a) the eco-physiological response of crop species to light quality; (b) the morpho-functional strategies of plant in phytoremediation studies (c)) the relationship between soil pollution, edaphic communities and photosynthesis in higher plants used in biomonitoring studies.
C. Arena is author of 130 publications peer-reviewed ISI-WoS/Scopus, and participated to more than 150 National and International congresses and workshops, most of them as speaker and invited speaker.
Maria del Coro Arizmendi
Dr. María del Coro Arizmendi is a biologist and full-time professor within the Facultad de Estudios Superiores Iztacala at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). She has over 26 years of academic experience focusing on the ecology, evolution, and conservation of birds. She has published extensively with 69 indexed articles, 11 books, and 35 book chapters, supported by funding from national and international agencies.
Her contributions include the "Gardens for Hummingbirds" project, promoting habitat restoration in urban areas, and have been recognized with numerous awards, including the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Recognition in 2018 and the Academic Merit Award at UNAM.
Paul A Ayayee
Dr. Paul Ayayee is an Assistant Professor of Biology within the Department of Biology at the University of Nebraska. His research interests include Insect-gut microbe interactions, Insect physiology and microbial ecology
Thomas Backhaus
Professor for Ecotoxicology and Environmental Sciences at the University of Gothenburg, with a main interest in regulatory (eco)toxicology and risk assessment of complex exposure situations.
Shaw Badenhorst
I am a zooarchaeologist at the Evolutionary Studies Institute of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. I analyse animal remains (bones and teeth) from archaeological and fossil sites. I have studied animal remains from South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, Canada (British Columbia) and the USA (Southwest). My focus of my research is on the origins of hunting, the spread of livestock, and taphonomy.
Volker Bahn
I am an Associate Professor of Biological Sciences at Wright State University. Previously I was a postdoctoral fellow at McGill University working in Macroecology with Brian McGill. My PhD is from the University of Maine in Wildlife Ecology with advisers Bill Krohn and Raymond O'Connor, and MS (German Diplom) in Conservation Biology from Philipps University Marburg with Harald Plachter and Peter Poschlod, in collaboration with Alan Burger from University of Victoria.
Francisco Balao
Francisco Balao is associate lecture of Plant Biology at the University of Seville; Past post-doc Marie-Curie fellow in the Department of Plant Systematics at the University of Vienna.
Research interests are mainly focused on how plant genomes interact with its environment across ecological and evolutionary timescale. We try to elucidate the mechanistic bases of the biodiversity through studies of molecular phylogenetics and phylogenomics, phylogeography, cytogenetics, ecophysiology, transcriptomics and reproductive biology.
Esteban Balseiro
Dr. Esteban Balseiro is a CONICET Researcher and Professor of Ecology at University of Comahue, Argentina. His area of interest is plankton ecology, food web interaction and ecological stoichiometry. In addition, to this he also researches stream ecology, ecological stoichiometry of aquatic insects and effect of climate change on freshwater food webs.