Jordi Voltas

Academic

Ph.D., University of Lleida, 1998
Agronomist, UPC, 1992
Agricultural Engineer, 1989

Research

My research activities are mostly focused on the ecophysiological and adaptive characterization of forest trees under Mediterranean conditions in the face of global change. In particular, I am interested in (i) the evaluation of intraspecific genetic variation and evolutionary trade-offs in life history traits in Mediterranean conifers; (ii) the identification and use of physiological traits of potential application in screening and breeding activities of forest trees (physiological breeding), in particular those associated to drought resistance; and (iii) the retrospective analysis of climate responses in forest trees and the interpretation of climate signals under current and future climate conditions using dendrochronological approaches. I also develop research in the evaluation of statistical tools that allow integrating physiological and environmental information into ecological response models. The aim of these models is to achieve a better understanding of genotype-environment interaction patterns linked to local adaptation and genetic variation in phenotypic plasticity relevant to ecological and evolutionary genetics and in breeding and deployment of genetic material in forest management practices. Many of my contributions to the aforementioned topics use as inferential tool the relative abundance of the main stable isotopes of the biosphere (13C/12C, 18O/16O, 2H/1H, 15N/14N), which are of widespread use in physiology, ecology and genetics of forest tree species. The information provided by this approach allows, among others, relating the isotopic signatures to environmental cues linked to precipitation, vapour pressure deficit and thermic regime, allowing an in-depth understanding of the interactions between plants and the environment. This methodology is valid for studying a broad scope of cases which include from the characterization of genetic differences in water use efficiency to the development of novel models of palaeoenvironmental inference using archaeobotanical remains. I have coauthored ca. 100 SCI articles and over 15 chapters of national and international books. I have also participated more than 20 competitive national research projects (in 7 as principal investigator) and in 5 competitive international projects (in four of them being principal investigator).