Bienvenido Martínez-Navarro

Bienvenido Martínez-Navarro

Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social

Humanities

Degree in Geology (1987) and PhD in Paleontology (1991). I work on Quaternary mammals, and participate at different Plio-Pleistocene projects around the World, been the co-leader of the Baza and Incarcal projects in Spain, the Oued Sarrat project in Tunisia, and the Engel Ela-Ramud project in Eritrea. I also participate in the study of the sites of Buia in Eritrea, Melka Wakena in Ethiopia, and Dmanisi in Georgia, and have worked in the past studying the sites of the Atbara River in Sudan, `Ubeidiya, Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, and Bizat Ruhama in Israel, Argentario and Pirro Nord in Italy, Vallonnet in France, and Cueva Victoria in Spain.

Research interests

I am a paleontologist working on Quaternary mammals from Europe, Asia and Africa. My main interest is to describe the ecological scenario where our ancestors, the earlier members of the genus Homo, evolving and dispersing from Africa, were able to colonize the middle latitudes of Eurasia, and survive in seasonal climates during the Pleistocene times. I have developed an intense research travelling around the world to study the African origin mammals dispersing into Eurasia, and the Eurasian origin mammals dispersing into Africa, in order to describe their systematics, phylogeny, biochronology, paleobiogeography, autoecology, and their potential ecological relationships among them and with hominins. I work on fossil hyenas, sabertoothed tigers, hunting dogs, bears, elephants and mastodonts, hippos, pigs, buffaloes, antelopes, deers, giraffes, camels, monkeys and other groups.

Selected publications

- Martínez-Navarro B, Pandolfi L, Medin T, Libsekal Y, Ghinassi M, Papini M & Rook L 2022, 'The ontogenetic pattern of Hippopotamus gorgops Dietrich, 1928 revealed by a juvenile cranium from the one-million-years-old paleoanthropological site of Buia (Eritrea)', Comptes Rendus Palevol 21(7), 157-153. 

- Rodríguez-Gómez G*, Palmqvist P, Martínez-Navarro B, Martín-González J & Bermúdez de Castro JM 2022. 'Mean body size estimation in large mammals and the computation of biomass in past ecosystems: An application to the Pleistocene sites of Orce and Sierra de Atapuerca (Spain)'. CR Palevol 21, 207-233.

- Palmqvist P*, Espigares MP, Pérez-Claros JA, Figueirido B, Guerra-Merchán A, Ros-Montoya S, Rodríguez-Gómez G, García-Aguilar JA, Granados A, Martínez-Navarro B, 2022. Déjà vu: A reappraisal of the taphonomy 1 of quarry VM4 of the Early Pleistocene site 2 of Venta Micena (Baza Basin, SE Spain). Scientific Reports, 12, 1, 705.

- Bartolini-Lucenti S*, Madurell-Malapeira J, Martínez-Navarro B, Cirilli O, Pandolfi L, Rook L, Bushkhianidze M, Lordkipanidze D, 2022. 'A comparative study of the Early Pleistocene carnivore guild from Dmanisi (Georgia)'. Journal of Human Evolution 162, 103108, 

- Palmqvist P, Rodríguez-Gómez G, Bermúdez de Castro JM, García-Aguilar JM, Espigares MP, Figueirido B, Ros-Montoya S, Granados A, Serrano FJ, Martínez-Navarro B & Guerra-Merchán A, 2022. 'Insights on the Early Pleistocene Hominin Population of the Guadix-Baza Depression (SE Spain) and a Review on the Ecology of the First Peopling of Europe'. Front. Ecol. Evol. 10:881651.

Selected research activities

I have done fieldwork at the Engel Ela-Ramud Basin (Eritrea) and at the Baza Basin (Andalucia, Spain), and lab work at the Museums of Baza and Granada  (Spain) and at the National Museum of Eritrea (Asmara).

I have taught “Paleontology of mammals” in the Erasmus Mundus Master on Quaternary and Prehistory, at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona).