Umberto Lombardo, new director of the ICTA-UAB
Umberto Lombardo is the new director of the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA-UAB). He takes over from Isabel Pont, who has been the institute's director since 2022.
The new management team is composed of Laura Talens as secretary; Álvaro Fernández-Llamazarez as deputy director; Patrizia Ziveri as scientific director; and Panagiota Kotsila, responsible of as member in charge of Gender Diversity and Wellbeing. The team also includes the coordinator of the Doctoral programme, Adriana Artola; Michaël Grelaud, head of Laboratories; Angelos Varvarousis, head of Offices; and Maica Nogales, Administration Officer.
Umberto Lombardo is a physical geographer who studies the events and processes that shaped the Amazonian landscape during the Holocene. His interests include neotectonics, fluvial geomorphology, paleosols, pre-Columbian agriculture, plant domestication, settlement patterns and the region’s earliest hunter-gatherer occupations. He is leading DEMODRIVER (ERC-COG), where his team is investigating the early human presence, landscape modifications and environmental change of Llanos de Moxos – Bolivian Amazon.
The ICTA-UAB community wishes to express its gratitude to Isabel Pont for the work she has carried out during her mandate as director.