University of Cagliari - Centre for Conservation of Biodiversity (UNICA - CCB)

The Centre for the Conservation of Biodiversity (CCB) is a structure of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Cagliari (UNICA). It was officially established in 2003 but it includes the Sardinian Germplasm Bank (BG-SAR) that was founded in 1997. It is located in Cagliari, inside the Botanical Gardens.
CCB and BG-SAR play a central role in the conservation of Sardinian plant diversity and the protection of the most sensitive ecosystems, aiming to preserve the endemic Sardinian taxa; principally the threatened ones but also those having phytogeographical interest.

The main activities and research areas are in situ and ex situ conservation, plant systematics and conservation genetics, alien species, phyto-remediation and archaeobotany.

Competences

• More than ten years of experience in the in situ and ex situ conservation of the Mediterranean flora
• Study, management and protection of native flora including endemic and threatened taxa
• Participation in several national and EU-funded research projects under different programs (APQ, Interreg, LIFE+, ENPI) and networking (Genmeda, ENSCONET, RIBES)
• More than 250 scientific publications and 400 presentations in national and international conferences during the last ten years
• Partnerships with public authorities and development agencies dealing with environmental management and plant genetic resources management (protected areas managers, forestry corps, local entities)
• Broad experience in the organisation of training and dissemination seminars, postgraduate summer schools, workshops, events related to the conservation of plant diversity