creaf

CREAF – Spain

The Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications (CREAF) is a public research center dedicated to terrestrial ecology and territorial analysis, producing knowledge and methodologies for conservation, management, and adaptation of the environment to global change. CREAF contributes cutting-edge scientific knowledge to the greatest and most complex environmental challenges facing society in the 21st century, with the aim of being the future mediterranean hub of ecological science and innovation within Europe.

Research carried out by the center covers four general areas:

  • Biodiversity – studies on the mechanisms which generate and maintain biodiversity in terrestrial ecosystems, analyzing territorial patterns of biodiversity and the factors which threaten it and working with species and communities of plants and animals, from the molecular to ecosystem scale.
  • Functional ecology and global change – studies on the effects of global change with an international and multidisciplinary focus, working at diverse scales (from the organism to the ecosystem), combining experimentation with modeling, and co
    nducting long-term monitoring of different ecosystems.
  • Forest ecology and wildfire – widely-recognized center in the creation of forest inventories and databases, and in the development of mathematical models for the study of forests, which help plan new strategies of forest management to preserve the natural, social and economic value of our forest ecosystems.
  • Environmental analysis and GIS – providing to the public a collection of digital maps of land use of various periods of time, designing new formats for storing and distributing thematic cartography, and developing computing tools such as the MiraMon GIS, all of which permit the consultation and analysis of a large quantity of information about our natural heritage.

Personnel involved: Joan Masó (Senior researcher), Ivette Serral (Project Assistant).