Presentation  

The Research Team in Plant Biodiversity and Biosystematics (GReB) comprises researchers from three Institutions: the Botany Laboratory of the Faculty of Pharmacy (University of Barcelona ), the Botanical Institute of Barcelona (Barcelona City Council/CSIC) and the Autonomous university of Barcelona .

GReB has over twenty years' experience in studies of the Biodiversity and Biosystematics of vascular plants of the Mediterranean region, and those of the Macaronesian, Iranian-Turanian and South American regions.

One of the Research Team’s prime concerns at the present time is the study of plant biodiversity in the Western Mediterranean area (Iberian Peninsula and North Africa) and South America as part of projects carried out within Spain (Iberian Flora) and in international cooperation (Hellenic Flora, Flora of Er Rif, Flora of Paraguay). The aim is to define and catalogue plant biodiversity and to establish the scientific basis for the appropriate management of  natural resources: relevant applications in this area are studies in ethnobotany (Iberian ethnoflora), the use of medicinal plants, computer techniques related to biodiversity and the conservation of endemic and endangered plants.

The other basic objective is the analysis of the evolutionary mechanisms which gave rise to the present diversity of plantlife by means of cytogenetic studies (cyto-biogeography, detailed analysis of karyotype using banding and in situ hybridization, quantification of nuclear DNA by flow cytometry), molecular systematics (DNA sequencing, marker molecules and isozyme electrophoresis) and population biology (population size, genetic structure, reproductive biology and pollination ecology) applied to different taxonomic groups (basically Asteraceae, Euphorbiaceae, Lythraceae and Ranunculaceae).