Mar Sobral Bernal is a Professor at the Department of Geography, University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, affiliated with the Faculty of Geography and History. She holds a PhD from the same institution (2010) focusing on selection pressures on fruit traits in Crataegus monogyna . Her work emphasizes evolutionary ecology of plant-animal interactions and global change impacts on biodiversity, particularly carbon cycling. She has conducted research at CNRS (France) and Stanford University (USA), and collaborates with groups like ANTE and EcoPast. Research interests include plant defense mechanisms, transgenerational plasticity, functional diversity effects on soil carbon, and science outreach addressing gender equity. Key findings explore how mammal biodiversity influences soil organic matter composition and how herbivory shapes plant phenotypic traits across generations. Publications span plant-animal interactions, climate impacts on ecosystems, and biodiversity-carbon links. Her recent work highlights the role of functional traits in carbon dynamics and transgenerational effects of herbivory. She advocates for equitable science through outreach and policy engagement.
