Roger Jovani Group leader. “Ramón y Cajal” researcher. I am interested on animal collective behaviour, evolutionay ecology of host-symbiont interactions, fractal patterns, and feather fault bars.

Santiago Guallar PhD student (2014-2018) I aim at reconstructing the evolution of moult strategies and unravelling the factors that influence molt pattern formation and variation in passerines. The approach involves unsupervised methods to reveal patterns and phylogenetic analyses to reconstruct trait evolution throughout the tree of this order.

María del Mar Labrador PhD student (2016-2020) I aim to understand the variability in feather mite abundance between bird species, and for same feather mite species on different host species. To do so, I am studying the diet and symbiotic bacteria of feather mite species in different bird species through a metabarcoding approach. I am also conducting experiments to understand the relevance of mite diet and symbionts on this interaction, and using the comparative method to understand which mite and bird species traits drive their interaction.

Past members

Jorge Doña PhD student (2014-2018). I am interested on understanding how biodiversity arise and is maintained in the host-symbiont system of birds and feather mites. I am using taxonomy, molecular ecology, lab experiments, comparative method, network analyses and individual-based models.

Anna Krystalli. Research Software Developer. My background is in macroecology, in particular plankton ecology, although I’ve recently been working on birds traits. I enjoy extracting pattern from large ecological datasets, as well as the process of building statistical tools and software. In JovaniLab I am working on phenotypic integration studying the network of bird traits’ evolutionary correlations.

Lorenzo Perez-Rodriguez , Severo Ochoa Postdoc (2013-2015).

Fractal geometry to study heterogeneous bird plumage patterns:
Pérez-Rodríguez, L., Jovani, R. & Stevens,M. (2017). Shape matters: animal colour patterns as signals of individual quality. Proc. R. Soc. B. , 000-000.
Jovani, R., Pérez-Rodríguez, L., Mougeot, F. (2013) Fractal geometry for animal biometrics: a response to Kühl and Burghardt. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 28: 499-500.
Pérez-Rodríguez, L., Jovani, R., Mougeot, F. (2013) Fractal geometry of a complex plumage trait reveals bird’s quality. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 280: 20122783.

Marina Moreno, Master student (2013-2014). Her goal was to understand why some species of feather mites are highly diverse in their COI mitocondrial DNA while others show a low diversity of haplotypes. She explored the hypothesis that mite species demographics (linked to bottlenecks) are behind the differences we found on the genetic diversity between mite species.

Javier Díaz Real, Undergraduate (2011) and post-graduate and master student (2012-2013). Javier was very involved in our feather mite studies in the field, and in the molecular lab. He is now doing the PhD Thesis in Universidade de Vigo.

Francisco José del Moral Ventura, Undergraduate student (2010). Fran was helping on a study on plumage colouration doing a literature review on bird field guides.

Laura Lázaro Prida, Undergraduate student (2010). Laura was helping on bird ringing field work and on lab work with fault bars.