María C. Diéguez, INIBIOMA-CONICET, Argentina
María C. Diéguez is a principal researcher of the National Council for Technology and Science of Argentina (CONICET) and works at the National Research Institute for Biodiversity and Environmental Studies (INIBIOMA) in Bariloche (Patagonia). She is in charge of the Mercury Monitoring Station EMMA settled by Project Global Mercury Observation System (GMOS) and coordinates a national project supporting ambient mercury monitoring inside Nahuel Huapi National Park. Her primary research field is aquatic ecology and her current research focuses in the linkages between the biochemical cycling of mercury and carbon in catchments along a wide bioclimatic gradient in northwestern Patagonia. Ongoing studies are centered in the movilization of Hg and C within Andean catchments in relation with climate seasonality, and their incorporation at the basal level of freshwater food webs through processes involving heterotrophic, autotrophic and mixotrophic organisms of the microbial loop.