Sílvia Ricardo Benoliel de Carvalho

My professional experience has always been linked to conservation biology. I started working in biodiversity conservation projects in 1996 by collaborating with the Portuguese Institute for Nature Conservation (ICN) in projects related to the conservation of the Iberian Desman (Galemys pyrenaicus). After finishing the B.Cs in Biology in 2001, I worked in different European projects related to wetlands conservation, inventory, monitoring and management. I also post-graduated in Land Use and Environmental Planning, which provided me the necessary skills to enroll in a PhD in the conservation planning field. The research conducted during my PhD aimed at addressing some unresolved issues in systematic conservation planning, particularly related with the type and quality of species distribution data, its dynamics and uncertainty, and its suitability as a surrogate for evolutionary processes.

I engaged as a post doctoral researcher at CIBIO-InBIO/UP in 2011. My current research interests focus on the interface between ecological modelling, systematic conservation planning and evolution. Particularly, I am interested in developing methodologies and tools to integrate phylogenetic relationships and spatial patterns of genetic diversity into systematic conservation planning. At the same time, I am collaborating in other projects related to biogeography and conservation planning across the Mediterranean basin and desert regions. I am also interested in the field of optimal monitoring of multiple species.