Marta López Carbonell is Professor from Department of Plant Physiology at University of Barcelona. Her topic of interest is Adaptations of Mediterranean plants to water stress-oxidative stress and their hormonal regulation.

 Water stress is one of the most limiting factors for plant survival under Mediterranian climate; indeed, the knowledge of the mechanisms involved in drought resistance and their regulation is a very important matter. Among the plant responses to drought, is particularly interesting the role of plant hormones like abscisic acid (ABA), some of its metabolites and its glucose ester (ABAGE). Since 1991 we started the analytical studies on endogenous hormones for the first time at the Faculty of Biology of the University of Barcelona until present. Thereafter, we have been studying the hormone level changes induced by water stress on Mediterranean plants (ABA, ABAGE, 3-indolacetic acid, zeatin riboside, 1-aminocyclopropane carboxylic acid and jasmonic acid) as well as the ultrastructural changes and the ABA immunolocalization in leaves. Moreover, taking into account that these situations are often related to oxidative stress, H2O2 accumulation and antioxidant compounds are also being studied. Keywords:  Water stress-Oxidative stress, Hormones, High Performance Liquid Chromatography associated with tandem Mass Spectrometry (HPLC-ESI-MS/MS), Transmission Electron Microscopy, Immunolocalization, ROS, Antioxidants, Mediterranean plants.