HQP Spotlight: Martina Sánchez Pinillos

We recently interviewed DIVERSE Post-Doctoral Fellow Martina Sánchez Pinillos, and she shared about her involvement in the project, and why she’s personally excited to be a part of DIVERSE.

Q: When did you start on the DIVERSE project?

Martina: April 2023.

Q: Where are you from?

Martina: I grew up in a small village in the mountains of La Rioja, in the North of Spain. However, I have spent many years in Madrid, Catalonia, Montpellier, and Montreal. All those places left an imprint on me.

Q: What is your educational background before this, and what led you to forestry/the discipline you are studying now?

Martina: I graduated as a Forest Engineer at the Technical University of Madrid (UPM, Spain). I have always been passionate about forests and numbers in equal parts and Forest Engineering had everything I liked. Then, I carried out a MSc in Advanced Forest Research (UPM) and, after that, I moved to Catalonia, where I did a PhD in forest ecology at the Forest Sciences Centre of Catalonia (CTFC, Spain). During my PhD, I had the opportunity to do a research stay at the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM) and study the resilience of boreal forests to insect outbreaks. I was so fascinated by the ecology of these forests that, after my doctorate, I returned to the UQAM as a postdoc to study the impacts of mild-dry conditions on forest mortality across Canada. Then, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowship at the Institute of Evolutionary Science of Montpellier (ISEM, CNRS, Univ. Montpellier; France) allowed me to lead the RESET project and develop a new methodological framework to assess ecological dynamic regimes. After that, I returned to the UQAM to collaborate on the DIVERSE project.

Above: Regeneration of a Mediterranean pine forest in Catalonia, where Martina studied it’s resistance to fire.

Q: Which Theme(s) are you involved in with DIVERSE, and who are you working with? 

Martina: My research counts with the collaboration of Daniel Kneeshaw, Christian Messier, and Marie-Josée Fortin. We will contribute to fulfilling the goals of Theme 2.

Q: Tell us about your research – what is your project about, and what led you to be interested in this, why is it important, etc.

Martina: In the context of unprecedented change, forests may follow unexpected dynamics as a response to environmental stressors. Developing and applying novel methodologies has the potential to uncover ecological phenomena that we were not aware of and define management strategies that promote forest resilience. My research is positioned in the interface between quantitative and forest ecology. Part of it focuses on developing new methodological approaches and technological tools to assess ecological resilience and detect potential regime shifts. Complementarily, I use these and other methods to evaluate the effects of multiple biotic and abiotic factors in post-disturbance forest dynamics. 

Q: What issues in forestry/your discipline “keep you up at night” (i.e. what topics or issues are of particular concern or interest)

Martina: If there is one thing that keeps me awake and eager to continue in my research, it is trying to capture and understand the great complexity of forest ecosystems and their responses to stressors in changing environmental conditions.

Q: What about the DIVERSE project intrigues you or gets you excited?

Martina: What excites me most about DIVERSE is the holistic perspective of the project, which integrates fundamental and applied science in close collaboration with practitioners and decision-makers. I believe this is a fantastic initiative to apply the latest science to prevent, or at least mitigate, the effects of global change.

You can also see Martina’s HQP website profile ici. Stay tuned for more HQP spotlights throughout the course of the project!