Prof. Juan Carlos Alonso, Director of the Project
Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas
José Gutiérrez Abascal 2, 28006 Madrid
Tel (+34) 91 411 13 28
Fax (+34) 91 564 50 78
jcalonso@mncn.csic.es
Juan C Alonso (Madrid, 1956), Research Professor of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), has specialized in behavioural ecology and conservation biology of birds. He has participated in 45 research projects, in 38 of them as principal researcher. After obtaining a PhD degree at the Universidad Complutense, Madrid, in March 1982, he worked at the CSIC as postdoctoral fellow and joined the research staff of the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales (MNCN) in 1985. He is author or co-author of 92 papers published in scientific journals (60 of them included in the Scientific Citation Index), 10 books or monographs, 21 book chapters, and 21 papers published in Proceedings of international congresses or meetings. The great bustard has been his study species in 29 projects. He has been tutor of 8 doctoral and 3 postdoctoral students, and supervisor of 7 PhD theses on great bustards. He currently leads the research group on great bustards at the Evolutionary Ecology department of the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales.

Dr. Luis M. Bautista
lmbautista@mncn.csic.es
Luis Miguel Bautista is Research Scientist of the CSIC since 2001. He has studied bird behaviour, particularly of farmland species. After obtaining his PhD degree with a thesis on flocking and foraging behaviour of wintering common cranes he spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow at the Universities of Oxford and Groningen. He is co-author of 30 scientific papers and has participated in 12 research projects. He has contributed to the conservation of the Spanish imperial eagle in Madrid region with a study on the effects of car traffic on the hunting behaviour of this species, recently published in the journal Conservation Biology. Now he works on habitat selection and foraging ecology of great bustards, and on the effects of human activities on this species.

 
Dra. Marina Magaña
mcnmm535@mncn.csic.es
Marina Magaña (Madrid, 1972) obtained her degree in Biology at the University of Alcalá de Henares in 1996. After working at the Doñana Biological Station, she joined our research team at the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales in October 1998 with a pre-doctoral fellowship from the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas – Comunidad de Madrid. In February 2007 she finished her PhD thesis on ‘The breeding behaviour of the Great Bustard’. She has participated in several projects on great bustards and co-authored some of the papers published by the team in the last years. Now she is a contracted researcher at the MNCN.

mcna143@mncn.csic.es
Carlos Palacín (Madrid, 1966), biologist specialized in conservation biology of endangered bird species, works at the MNCN since 1998, where he has finished his PhD thesis “Migratory behaviour of the great bustard in the Iberian Peninsula”. He has participated in 26 projects on steppe birds and raptors, co-authored the review of the conservation status of great bustards and hobby in Spain and reviewed the regional list of endangered species of flora and fauna of the Comunidad de Madrid.

Carlos Ponce
carlosp@mncn.csic.es
Carlos Ponce (Madrid, 1978) obtained his degree in Biology at the Universidad Autónoma of Madrid in 2003. As an expert ringer and ornithologist he joined the group to study the disturbances caused to great bustards by human activities within the project CSIC-HENARSA, and to study bird mortality caused by collision with powerlines. He is also carrying out his PhD thesis on “Efficiency of agri-environmental schem for great bustards and other steppe-land birds in Madrid region”.

Carolina Bravo
c.bravo@mncn.csic.es
Carolina Bravo (Madrid, 1982) obtained her degree in Biology at the Universidad Autónoma of Madrid in 2006. She did her master project within our team on “Sexual differences in the animal fraction of the diet of the great bustard in Madrid region”. She continues working on the diet of the species, in the framework of the current project “Efficiency of agri-environmental scheme for the conservation of great bustards and other steppe-land birds in the IBA Jarama-Henares”.

Alfredo García

alfre@mncn.csic.es 

Alfredo García (Madrid, 1984) obtained his degree in Environmental Sciences at the Universidad Autónoma of Madridin 2006. He joined the group to do his master project on “Agri-environmental scheme and habitat selection during the mating season by great bustards (Otis tarda L.)”. He currently works on mortality of great bustards at powerlines, as well as on the effects of human development on this species.

Brief history of the team
  
The team directed by Dr Juan C. Alonso has investigated several aspects of the socioecology of gregarious birds. They started studying the relationships between food availability and foraging behaviour of flocking birds, and now work on more complicated social relationships including parental care, phenotype-limited ideal free distribution systems, individual life histories, interindividual relationships within breeding groups, and metapopulation dynamics. The project referred to in this website is currently the main research line of the team: the breeding ecology, dispersal, population dynamics, and conservation biology of great bustards.

Juan C. Alonso and Javier A. Alonso have collaborated in several projects since 1979, and published numerous papers on the ecology and behaviour of various bird species, including cranes, storks and bustards.
Marina Magaña and Carlos Palacín work within the project CSIC-HENARSA, after having carried out their PhDs, respectively on breeding behaviour and migration ecology, since they joined the team as predoctoral fellows in 1988.
Luis M. Bautista carried out his PhD with us (1987-1992), and returned to the team in 2004, as an expert in behaviour and population dynamics modelling.
Carlos Ponce joined in the group in 2003, Carolina Bravo in 2005 and Alfredo García in 2006.
Since we started our research line on great bustards the following persons have worked in our team (some still participate in various phases of the research or publication of the results):
Dr. Javier Alonso, Professor at the Departamento de Zoología y Antropología Física, Facultad de Biología, Universidad Complutense, Madrid.
Dr. Enrique Martín (1990-98), pre-doctoral fellow of the Ministry for Education and Science 1993-97.
Dr. Manuel Morales (1992-2000), pre-doctoral fellow of the Comunidad de Madrid - CSIC 1994-98, now at the Departamento Inter-universitario de Ecología of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Dr. Carlos Martín (1995-2006), pre-doctoral fellow of the CSIC 1995, of the Comunidad de Madrid - CSIC 1996-2000, contracted as post-doctoral researcher in our team 2001-2006. No w he is I3P-researcher at the Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos (IREC) (CSIC, UCLM, JCCLM)).Dr. Simon J. Lane (1997-1999), postdoctoral fellow of the European Union (Marie Curie Training and Mobility of Researchers Program), to work on the project “Habitat and space requirements of endangered great bustard Otis tarda populations in agricultural areas of Spain” (project ERB FMBI CT96-1471).
Beatriz Martín (2000-2006), COIE fellow UCM-CSIC 1999-00, pre-doctoral fellow at the MNCN 2001-2002, pre-doctoral fellow of the Comunidad de Madrid - CSIC 2002-2006.

Dr. Patirck Osborne, University of Stirling, UK; Prof. Christian Pitra, Institut für Zoo- und Wildtierforschung, Berlin, Germany; Dr. Zine Arhzaf, SEEPOM, and Prof. Mohammed Dakki, Institute Scientifique de Rabat, Morocco.

Finally, since 1997 various foreign researchers have collaborated with us in some of our projects: 

List of other fellows that have participated in the project:
-          Elena Izquierdo (fellow UCM-CSIC, 1997-98)
-          Fernando Arévalo Ramón (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2000-01)
-          Sonia Sánchez Rivilla (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2000-01)
-          Pablo Vergara (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2001-02)
-          Iván de las Heras (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2002-03)
-          Rubén Manzanedo (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2003-04)
-          Pablo Sastre (post-doctoral contract, 2003-2005)
-          Imelda Fernández (pre-doctoral fellow, 2003-2004)
-         Alicia de la Hoz  (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2005-05)
-          Laura Martínez  (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2005)
-          Desiree Rivera García (fellow UAM-CSIC, 2006-07)
-         Gema Hernán Martínez (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2006-07)
-          Laura Hernández (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2006-07)
-     Alberto Lucas García (fellow C.O.I.E. UCM-CSIC, 2006-07)