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Nora Fernandez Fernandez
Today, Wednesday March 22, the official award ceremony for the 2022 doctoral and post-doctoral scholarships from the “la Caixa” Foundation is celebrated. One of those chosen for this edition has been Cayetano Gutiérrez Cánovas (Cartagena, 1982), a member of the URJC Conservation and Biodiversity Area.
According to the researcher himself, "I was awarded this scholarship about a year ago, but now that all those selected have already received it, is when this official act takes place." Founder and coordinator of iberrios, Gutiérrez explains that this project "consists of creating an Iberian-scale observatory to study how rivers respond to climate change and, in general, to human changes produced on the peninsula."
The main objective, continues Gutiérrez, is "to observe how the health of the rivers changes, and the pioneer of this project is to study the biodiversity of the rivers over time, as an evolution." The final result aims to provide scientific evidence to reverse ecological degradation and promote long-term sustainability.
Even so, "we still do not have enough perspectives to draw conclusions," says Gutiérrez. “What we are seeing is that, for various reasons, not just climate change, rivers carry less and less water. Rivers that did not dry up before now dry up a little, or some that used to dry up for a month or two now do so for more months,” he adds.
The URJC researcher has been selected for a Junior Leader postdoctoral fellowship contract, from the "la Caixa" Foundation, until 2025. "This grant allows me to develop the Observatory project for at least 3 more years and put into operation the collaborative network of the Observatory, made up of 90 researchers who work together”, Gutiérrez specifies.
"What is ambitious and innovative about this project is to address the problem from temporal and spatial scales like never before, from there we will be able to observe the evolution of the health of rivers in research," says the coordinator of IberRíos. “In addition, we have been able to incorporate new techniques to observe the DNA of rivers, through the collection of water, sediments and species”, he specifies.
The studies, which began in 2022, were carried out in 63 Iberian river sites of great interest due to their climatic conditions, intensification of land use and riparian cover. According to Gutiérrez, who also coordinates the platform EcoMandanga, “the results of this project will help to characterize rivers on an Iberian scale, which will help preserve and restore the health of rivers in the Peninsula”.