= Joan Garcia-Porta
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<Joan Garcia-Porta> is a <biologist> studying how organisms adapt and diversify in new environments. His research combines <phylogenetics>, <morphology>, <ecology> and <genomics>, with investigations of <lizards>, <birds> and <plants>. A recurring question is how environmental differences become differences among populations and species.<Joan Garcia-Porta research profile at Universidad Complutense de Madrid>[First-person research summary and four research themes]{ref}
In a 2019 study, <Joan Garcia-Porta> and collaborators combined <phylogenomics> and <fossil calibration> to reconstruct a dated <phylogenetic tree> of 262 species of <Lacertidae>. They compared this evolutionary history with occupied <climate> conditions, preferred body <temperature> and <evaporative water loss>. Temperate lineages showed slower molecular substitution rates than tropical and desert-adapted lineages.<Environmental temperatures shape thermal physiology as well as diversification and genome-wide substitution rates in lizards by Joan Garcia-Porta and others>[Abstract:262-species dated tree, physiological comparisons and substitution-rate contrast]{ref}
The illuminating feature is the combination of timescales: <DNA> differences inform relationships over evolutionary time, while physiological measurements describe what living <lizards> do now. Their agreement can support a proposed connection between <climate> and <adaptation>. A comparative association still needs interpretation; a <phylogenetic tree> alone does not experimentally demonstrate the cause of a physiological difference.
\Image[https://www.ucm.es/bcv/file/foto_garciaporta?ver=n]
{title=Joan Garcia-Porta}
{description=Portrait identified on the https://www.ucm.es/bcveng//joan-garcia-porta[university research-group profile].}
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