CBMA welcomes Mar Villar, visiting scientist from the University of Valencia

Mar Villar, a researcher from the University of Valencia, is visiting us with the goal of boosting her research on fish parasites. She plans to develop DNA reference libraries and apply DNA (meta)barcoding to investigate and monitor the biodiversity of marine fish parasites, and possible intermediate invertebrate hosts, across all life history stages.

Mar Villar earned her PhD in Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology (2021) at the Cavanilles Institute of Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology (University of Valencia), focusing on marine parasitology. Her research focuses on the biodiversity, taxonomy, and phylogenetic relationships of parasites in marine ecosystems, with a particular emphasis on their ecology and on host-parasite interactions. She combines field studies with morphological and molecular analyses to uncover parasite diversity and understand evolutionary patterns. Her work also explores applied aspects, aiming to improve the management of parasitic infections in aquaculture.

As a visiting reseacher at CBMA, she will mostly interact with colleagues and students from the Molecular Ecology, Biodiversity and DNA Barcoding Laboratory (ME BARCODE), establishing scientific partnerships with her host (Filipe Costa) and exploring the potential of DNA (meta)barcoding in her own research. We’re excited to have Mar with us and we wish her a fruitful and mutually beneficial collaboration!