About – LIA

The International Associated Laboratory (LIA) “Biodiversity and Evolution” is a “laboratory without walls” created in 2014 and co-funded by CNRS (Centre national de la Recherche Scientifique) and FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) that formalizes the cooperation between three research units from France and Portugal to develop collaborative research on Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology.

The LIA Biodiversity and Evolution puts together researchers from three research units:

ISEM – Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution – Montpellier (CNRS, UMR 5554; Université Montpellier; IRD; EPHE)

CEFE – Centre d’Écologie Fonctionelle et Évolutive (CNRS, UMR 5175; Université Montpellier, Université Paul Valéry Montpellier, IRD, Montpellier Sup’Agro, INRA, EPHE)

CIBIO – Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos (InBIO Laboratório Associado; Universidade do Porto; ICETA).

History

The LIA was built upon several well established collaborations among researchers who, for a decade before 2014, had conducted 18 research projects in close collaboration, produced 25 joint scientific publications, and had co-supervised several graduate students (3 PhD and 9 MSc).

Research

Collaborations of the LIA are centred on three main research axes:

Hybridisation, adaptation and speciation

Behavioural ecology

Biodiversity of deserts and arid regions

Organization

The research teams and laboratories associated through the LIA Biodiversity and Evolution retain their separate autonomy, status, director and location. The LIA is coordinated by two co-principal investigators representing the French and Portuguese partners and supervised by a scientific steering committee.

Co-Principal Investigators